The oldest town in the province Drenthe, Coevorden grew up around a castle on a ford on the road between Münster and Groningnen. In the 17th century Coevorden was completely reworked as a fortified city by the Dutch military mastermind Menno van Coehoorn. The pattern of concentric polygonal streets, and star-shaped outer moat all remain …
An arty and well-to-do coastal village minutes from Alkmaar, Bergen aan Zee is in the sandy folds of the North Holland dunes. From as early as the 1600s the dunes, sky and sea were a source of inspiration to artists. But it was the Expressionists and Cubists of the early 20th century who made their …
The small but photogenic town of Monnickendam was a big-hitter at the turn of the 17th century, pulling in trade from across the Baltic Sea. A cosy old tangle of streets survives from that time, on the harbour are smokehouses and shipyards, two of Monnickendam’s signature industries. Since the Zuiderzee was dammed, becoming a set …
In the space of a century a lot of things have changed for Marken. What used to be an island is now a peninsula, joined to North Holland by a dike in 1957. Before that, the surrounding Zuiderzee became a freshwater lake when the Afsluitdijk dam was completed in 1932, ending Marken’s fishing trade. This …
On the Belgian border in Limburg, the origins of the white village of Thorn go back to the last quarter of the 10th century when it was founded as a Benedictine abbey. This was a monastery for noble women, but also its own principality with all kinds of privileges. For 500 years Thorn was able …
In the 17th and 18th century the shipping industry made a fortune for the people of Hindeloopen. At that time this town, with a fleet of 100 ships, even developed its own style of dress and interior design. Where Hindeloopen was once on a bay of the North Sea (the Zuiderzee), in the early-1930s the …
A city of 30,000 in Friesland, Heerenveen has a sporting prowess that belies its modest size. Thialf, the Netherlands’ top speed skating arena is here, and this is big news in a nation that leaves all competition trailing on the ice. The local football team , SC Heerenveen will forever be synonymous with the famed …
This ever-growing city is the largest urban centre in Gelderland’s Achterhoek region. Doetinchem’s streetscape is modern, after devastating bombing raids by Allied forces at the close of the Second World War. The central Sint-Catherinakerk was quickly rebuilt and has some historic furnishings and a Medieval font discovered during the restoration. The Stadsmuseum is an excellent …
Even older than Amsterdam, Doesburg is a fortified city where the Oude IJssel flows into Gelderse IJssel, a branch of the Rhine. In Medieval times trade on the IJssel was booming, and during this period Doesburg was the economic capital of a region called the Doesburg Quarter, part of the larger Zutphen Quarter. The IJssel …
In a gap between high dunes on the west coast of Walcheren, Zoutelande is an amiable village on what is known as the Zeeland Riviera. The Blue Flag beach at Zoutelande is at a kink in Walcheren’s coastline, and so faces south, granting it more hours of sunshine than any other location in the Netherlands. …