Natuurmuseum Fryslân in Leeuwarden

You're standing at the Natuurmuseum Fryslân, the natural history museum of Friesland, in Leeuwarden. It's housed in a building with a remarkable past: the New City Orphanage. From 1675 to 1953 orphans lived here, as many as three hundred at its peak. They were known as 'the blue orphans', after their blue clothes in the colour of the city's coat of arms. The boys worked in the carpentry shop, the girls in the sewing room or as maids.