Atria, institute for gender equality and women’s history

Atria wants to connect women’s history and information on women and gender, with policy, topical matters and politics. Atria was established in 2012, after a merger between Aletta, institute for women’s history and E-Quality, Information centre for gender, family and diversity issues. On 28 January 2013, Atria was launched at the venue ‘Rode Hoed’ in Amsterdam.  

Atria houses one of the oldest collections on women and gender world-wide, and documents and preserves women’s history. Placing issues in an historical perspective makes the institute unique. The department of Collections manages and preserves an extensive archive with, amongst others, material from various women’s organizations, diaries and audio-visual material. Atria manages more than 600 different archives of individuals and organizations. The oldest of these archives, date from around 1870, while new archives are being added regularly. All in all, the collection contains more than 1200 meters of shelf space dedicated to archive materials. 

Archive materials and ego documents can only be viewed on site at the library. You can request photocopies of archive pieces, but photocopies can only be made if the condition of the piece allows it. It is also possible to have archive materials from Atria sent to other archival institutions for viewing on their premises. Likewise, Atria can host archive material from other institutions for viewing on site at Atria. If you would like to view archive materials or make other special arrangements, please contact Atria’s archivist.