Dutch Homes Then and Now, Jodi M Noord

I thought you all might like to see the homes in the Goes area. I can’t say I have seen inside many of them. We don’t know people well enough to be invited into homes yet. But it is still interesting to see the outside of homes! I will start with the oldest homes and move to the newest. This post will be mostly pictures, but I think you will enjoy getting the idea of what private residences look like around here.

Homes Built Hundreds of Years Ago

The first pictures will be of the oldest homes. I have posted several pictures of the original type homes before. Now residents refer to these homes as being in the “Centrum” or center of town. But when they were built, they were the only homes in town, located very close to the stores and businesses. Most of the homes in these pictures were built between the 1500s and 1800s. These residences are still privately owned. This type of home is what we live in. We live in an upper floor apartment.

Windmill Homes

Next I will post a couple of pictures of Windmill homes. These residences were connected to the windmills so that the caretakers could stay right on the premises. The family that cares for the windmill in Goes still lives in the home connected to the Molen de Koornbloem.

This is the home connected to the Goes windmill, Molen de Koornbloem. You can see the windmill on the left side of the picture. The windmill was build in 1801. It still grinds grain at certain times of the year.

This windmill is in the town of Delft. You can see the original house attached to the mill. The house is now a giftshop.

"In Between" Homes

The homes in this section were probably built in the 1800s or after. They are located just on the outskirts of the Centrum, or the original business area. One can see how the homes changed as the town grew. They began to look different than the stores, and distanced themselves from the business area. Take a look at the largest picture of the back yards. You can see how they are long, narrow, fenced in, and a little crowded.

Country Homes

Below are some images of farms around Goes. These homes are several hundreds of years old too. The farms often have cows, sheep or horses. The crops vary. The locals say that the Netherlands doesn’t specialize in one crop. They grow just about everything.

This particular farm is basically in town. It’s sheep field is right in the middle of traffic. You can tell the town built around this farm as the city grew.

Modern Day Housing

For awhile the more recent housing got away from the traditional dutch fronts, but I was told they are building them with tradition in mind again. Builders are putting the decorative scalloped roofs on, as well as the hooks they used to lift heavy grain bags with years ago. I don’t have any pictures of this newest trend unfortunately, but the newest houses would look something like the oldest houses. 🙂

The picture on the left would be the closest to the recent trend in traditional style construction. Notice how the fronts are peaked and shaped with a dutch front?

Common Factors

There are a couple things that all of these private residences have in common, no matter their age. The Dutch seem to use one material for the outside of homes – brick. The homes 500 years ago used brick, and the homes today use brick. When I took a walking tour in Amsterdam, the guide said that the very first residents did use wood on the exterior, but when a fire took out most of Amsterdam, they switched to brick and never went back. Not sure if that is why the whole country uses it? Another thing all these homes have in common is a flat front entry. I’m not referring to Dutch Fronts necessarily, but the fact that the front door is always flush with the front wall. You rarely see jutted out or recessed entrances. You rarely see covered or enclosed porches. The front entrance is always a door in the middle an exterior wall. Period. Nothing much fancy about it.

And that, my friends, is a brief overview of the homes around Goes. Hope you enjoyed the tour.