december-2012

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Big windows, with no curtains The Dutch Light colours and bare wood Elaborate ceiling stuccos Clever use of space
Modern Dutch interior style is playful, chic and calm. Jane Szita fi nds it was hundreds of years in the making “The typical Dutch home?” Design agent Rini van Beek is sitting in her light, white, sparsely furnished living room, and gazing at the view through a fl oor-to-ceiling expanse of immaculately polished glass. “I think the most characteristic style is more or less minimalistic,” she says. “Carefully chosen design pieces, a calm space, with nothing excessive or unnecessary. It’s all about reducing everything you need to the minimum, and limiting not just the number of pieces of furniture, but also the materials. Using few materials gives a quiet feeling.” As Van Beek is a design professional, it’s not surprising that her own home fi ts the description perfectly – the type of simple but stylish Dutch dwelling seen on blogs like Bloesem and in the pages of international interiors magazines. Spend some time in Th e Netherlands, and you’ll see any number of houses that match this ideal. Chances are you won’t even have to step foot inside them, thanks to the national habit of leaving the curtains open at night, putting the illuminated interior of just about every home on show. Framed by tall, wide windows, those clutter-free rooms with snowy walls, large wooden tables, fl eamarket fi nds and quirky lamps do show well. Are Dutch homes designed to be seen this way? “Th ere is an element of showing off your taste,” says interior designer Maurice van Berkel at his light-fi lled studio – a sleek but sculptural space – on the Weteringschans in Amsterdam. “Duch homes are always open to the world in this way. It’s as if we want to stay in contact with the street. Th ere’s a theory that the open curtains are down to “ Th e most characteristic style is more or less minimalism” INTERIORS HOME Calvinism – wanting the world to see that you’re not up to anything ungodly – but I prefer to think that it refl ects our society’s traditional openness to other cultures. It’s something you don’t see in other countries.” Whatever the cultural reasons for these large, literal windows onto Dutch lives, their architectural origins can be traced back to the 17th century. House frontages were taxed according to width, and builders responded by erecting tall, narrow homes, which needed big windows at the front, to maximise daylight and allow goods in and out without negotiating the steep stairs. Big windows also reduced the weight of the brick structures – an important consideration in a country where everything was built on wooden piles driven into the sand. Th e elegant results of these practical provisions were the calling card of a fl edgling nation. Th e Dutch Republic was busily reinventing itself as a society run not by church or aristocrats, but by a prosperous, urban merchant class. Holland Herald 41
Page 1 and 2: Holland Herald DECEMBER 2012 YOUR C
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Page 7 and 8: Cover illustration: Helen Musselwhi
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Page 11 and 12: TREATS ART Be chic hic with a clear
Page 14 and 15: FRONTLINES INTERNET 14 Holland Hera
Page 17 and 18: THE FILES #01 HOME Open kitchen Pho
Page 19: THE FILES #02 HOME Carpet cruise Th
Page 23 and 24: THE FILES #04 HOME Nest in show The
Page 26 and 27: Facts+ figures Snakes ’n’ shudd
Page 28 and 29: 28 Holland Herald Go with Water for
Page 30 and 31: addition to the city’s waterways.
Page 32 and 33: Morene Dekker takes her paddle boar
Page 34 and 35: TOP Tourists pose with the iAmsterd
Page 36 and 37: PHOTOGRAPHY HOME No place like home
Page 39: Khalkh: Mongolia, Töv Aimag, 2007
Page 43 and 44: Tin y, well- used balconies imitato
Page 45 and 46: Millions of kilometres away, automa
Page 47 and 48: not to mention water and oxygen? Th
Page 49 and 50: smiles TRAVEL ZIMBABWE With its cov
Page 51 and 52: BELOW A hippo wallows in Mana Pools
Page 53 and 54: ut take time to relax with a gin an
Page 55 and 56: game In the south of The Netherland
Page 57 and 58: of Russian oligarchs, globe-trottin
Page 59 and 60: Time will defi nitely fl y at Schip
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Page 63 and 64: A FLEET OF EDAM SHIPS, BY JAN MOLEN
Page 65: A JEWEL IN FRANCE'S CROWN A RIOT OF
Page 68 and 69: The master bedroom. CuraçaoXL is p
Page 71: A SMILE GOES A LONG WAY TRADITIONS
Page 74 and 75: CARIBBEAN COLOUR DON’T MISS Small
Page 76 and 77: BAGS Hartenstraat 37 1016 CA Amster
Page 78 and 79: The country is blessed with an incr
Page 80 and 81: Merry Christmas Take it easy this C
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The Creativity of the Thirties revi
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NEW WINTER COLLECTION Fashionable s
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