The City

With over 1200 monuments, Middelburg has every right to call itself a city with a history. Walking along the stately canal houses and the back alleys that you come across in the centre of the city, you will breathe in the history of Middelburg.
 

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Middelburg

Out and About

Middelburg is bustling. There is always a cosy little cafe where you can have something to drink. You can breathe in culture at one of the many galleries the city boasts. Events are also organised regularly and there is nearly always a performance you can go to during the theatre season.

Cafes, discos and restaurants

A little bit of springtime sun shines cautiously through the clouds. People are flocking to the terraces and you can barely manage to find the one empty table that is left. Hang around at the bar until the small hours and have meaningless conversations. Dance until you drop. Eating warming and delicious chips somewhere, or letting the authentic Zeeland mussels melt on your tongue. Going out in Middelburg is a delight. You will find most of the catering establishments in the area around the Markt, de Vlasmarkt, Plein 1940 and the Dam. Find somewhere you fancy, flop into a chair and indulge yourself!

Theatre, cinema and concerts

Moved to tears, breathless and glued to your cinema seat. An exciting evening at the theatre, cutting-edge cabaret, powerful and wonderful singing and sparkling dance shows. The Middelburg theatres and cinema offer this all and a lot more. Movies with English soundtracks are subtitled in Dutch and therefore still easily understandable for foreigners. Stage performances are mainly in Dutch.

Art and museums

Middelburg hosts numerous special monuments. A large part of the buildings in its centre are protected monument or are covered by the city landscape preservation regulations. Walk through Middelburg and you are walking through an open-air museum. At the same time, all the wonderful art out in the open makes the city feel like an open-air gallery.
You can enjoy art and culture to the full in Middelburg indoors too. There are three museums (Speelgoedmuseum Lientje, the Zeeuws Museum and the Zeeuws Archief) and a large number of galleries.

Please go to the Tourist Shop for precise dates of events or information about museums, performances or galleries.

Shopping

Middelburg town centre has every kind of shop you could wish for. Dedicated shoppers know that shopping is not just about quantity but also about quality. Here again Middelburg scores high marks. In fact, it is one of the three most varied shopping towns in the Netherlands! Shopped till you dropped? Take heart, you just found the ideal excuse to take a break in one of the many small restaurants or pavement cafes. Middelburg town centre is a perfect mix of shops and refreshment venues.

Events

Being one of the southern Dutch cities, Middelburg has a genuinely exuberant lifestyle. Festivals and events are therefore organised regularly. One authentic popular celebration is Koninginnedag (the Queen’s Birthday). Dress up in orange and dive into the partying crowd. Middelburg also hosta two events that are typical of Zeeland. Traditional folk holidays are held in July and in August. Races known as ‘ringrijd’ competitions and ‘sjezenrijd’ competitions are held on the first folk holiday. A ringrijd competitor rides on horseback while attempting to manoeuvre a lance through a small ring. This is also the aim of the sjezenrijd competition, but here the means of transport is a beautifully decorated horse cart. Only ringrijd competitions are held on the second day. Don’t miss the Zeeland Nazomer festival either. There are performances throughout the whole of the province and the Abdijplein at Middelburg has musical performances almost every evening.