De Witte Raaf

English translation

The text above is the record as published by the Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed, in Dutch. The English below is a machine translation made by TreeAlive, not by the Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed; it has not been checked by a person. Where the two differ, the original is the record. Report a translation error: privacy@treealive.com

Description

COUNTRY HOUSE "De Witte Raaf": built in 1936 according to the principles of the New Building movement (Groep 32) to designs by architect A. Komter, constructed in steel-frame construction, detached, whitewashed RESIDENTIAL HOUSE with upper storey, on a rectangular plan and covered by a wooden lean-to roof laid with Timeroid, rising from west to east (on this side with broad overhang); next to each other, against the northern part of the west gable a garage and an entrance partly screened on the west side with glass but otherwise open, each under a curved roof, which on the open south side of the entrance rests on three slender steel columns; against the northernmost part of the east gable an extension (part of kitchen and servants' room) with lightly curved, whitewashed, constructed in brick, blind south gable, with on the north side, adjoining the east gable a garden wall with an undercut door at the top and flatly covered with a terrace, provided with parapet on north and south sides and railings with spikes on the east side; along the remaining part of the east gable on the upper storey a balcony, enclosed by railings with spikes.

The construction of the main mass consists - above concrete foundations, cellars and the floor of the ground storey - of a very light steel frame, the columns of which are embedded in concrete, to which the steel windows and doors are directly attached and against and between which whitewashed, non-load-bearing, brick inner and outer walls are positioned; the upper part of the east gable is clad with tarred timber sections; windows and door openings set slightly back from the facade plane (in the east gable on the ground storey in the three southernmost bays a horizontal rectangular window, further adjacent to the extension opening doors coupled to window, each with horizontal rectangular fanlight and closed to plinth height, and in the extension a divided window with very narrow fanlights; on the upper storey in each of the seven bays divided, horizontal rectangular window or closing to window-sill height but otherwise glazed opening doors; in the south gable a garden door; in the west gable on the ground storey double front door coupled to window, each closed to plinth height, a round stairwell window divided by double vertical and horizontal spikes into nine sections and a horizontal rectangular, partly projecting window running around the corner with the south gable, and on the upper storey directly under the roof per bay (except that above the round window) a low horizontal rectangular window, vertically divided into four; in the north gable a long horizontal rectangular kitchen window and kitchen door.

The original interior layout remains completely intact. On the ground storey a large L-shaped living space, in which the library can be separated from the sitting room by means of a straight sliding wall and the dining room by means of a curved sliding wall; on the upper storey traditional layout, where in two places curved walls have been used.

On account of the overall architectural and technical design of interior and exterior, the original situation and as one of the finest works within the oeuvre of architect A. Komter, the above-mentioned residential house is regarded as a sound and representative example of the Dutch contribution to the New Building movement (Groep 32) from the period 1920-1940 - although the use of curved lines and the lean-to roof mark the departure from the aesthetics of functionalism and the search for a "beautiful" architecture that is not only purely functional - of general importance because of its significance for the development of modern architecture.