A certain Mrs Box-Sluijter (1885-unknown) won this doll’s room in a raffle at the Burgerweeshuis (civic orphanage) around 1932. The annual raffle was probably organized as a fundraiser for the orphanage, and it is likely that the orphans made the doll’s room themselves. The dolls are dressed in the uniform that, until 1919, was compulsory for the children to wear. The interior of the room is perhaps also inspired by one or more of the rooms within the Burgerweeshuis building. You are now standing in the building of the former Burgerweeshuis (1520-1959); to be precise, in the former ‘older girls refectory’. Usually around 500 children lived at the orphanage, and in years of large epidemics such as bubonic plague and cholera, that number sometimes rose to around 900. Girls and boys lived separately. This is where they went to school or learned a trade. The Burgerweeshuis was only open to officially registered citizens of Amsterdam. It received a substantial income from its landed property holdings, taxes, lotteries, collection campaigns and Amsterdam’s city theatre.