Huize Overbunde

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

Introduction

The former convent with boarding school was founded in 1875 on the estate "Overbunde", two years after the last owner of the estate, Mrs Nelissen-Lemmens, had donated the manor house, partly destroyed by fire in 1873, to the Franciscan sisters of Heijthuijsen. (The oldest sources in which the noble manor house estate - an estate of the lords of Valkenburg - is mentioned date from the end of the 14th century). From the outset the donation was intended for the German branch of the sisters of Heijthuijsen, established in Freckenhorst (Westphalia), who had to relocate there because of the Kulturkampf. The move to Bunde of the entire convent, including the boarding school for German pupils, was realized on 1 April 1876, a date which is thus also regarded as the actual date of foundation; the dedication of the chapel took place on 7 April of that year. Since 1920 the convent also served as a holiday house (recognized in 1932), since 1923 as a recovery home for women and children of mineworkers and until 1968 as a special education school.

Description

U-shaped main building, the final form rendered in imitation bond brickwork came about in several phases during the years 1875-1886. Main wing provided with two storeys and gabled roof with roof dormers with zinc ridge ornamentation. The side wings provided with one storey and gabled roof. Built-out, single-storey entrance section against main wing with natural stone balustrade and above it, by means of pilaster strips emphasized and crowned by a small stepped gable in neo-Gothic style. In the spandrel of the central projection a Mary statue of natural stone, resting on a colonette and capital. Against the right side of the main wing - more or less in line with the right front wing - a single-aisle, brick and richly executed convent chapel in neo-Gothic style. The chapel is situated on the upper floor and is undercrofted (barrel vaults). Tower-shaped adjacent rooms and indrawn three-sided closed choir. Fine roof plan with roof dormers with ridge ornamentation, cross flower, crockets, roof cross and a slender, richly ornamented roof turret with high spire. Cross vaults with ribs with pear-shaped moulding profile, carried by half-capitals on bundled colonettes. Above the entrance a gallery and in the nave decorative stained glass made in the workshop of Hertel & Lersch in Düsseldorf and dated 1896, with in the closing depictions of Elizabeth of Hungary flanked by Clara and Margaret. To the north-west against the main wing a wing with two storeys and gabled roof and in the long facades rows of slightly ogee-arched six-light windows: early 20th century. Followed by a short wing, built in 1932 according to the design of architect A.J.N. Boosten, with on the (open) courtyard side a built-out staircase with coloured stained glass in abstract-geometric forms. During a renovation in 1966 the facades on the village side, at ground floor level, were seriously damaged. School with upper floor and gabled roof: c. 1876. In the gable ends climbing spandrels, with a window in the middle: in the long facades windows with ceramic infills under the segmented arch. Not of monumental importance are the 1949 extension in line with the left wing at the front (built as rector and doctor's residence), as well as the extensions against the original school building, the originally free-standing, elongated building to the right of the chapel as well as the farmhouse.

Valuation

"Overbunde" is of cultural-historical importance because of the (building) history of the estate Overbunde, of which traces of the manor house are still present behind the oldest, rendered part of the convent, and because of the religious, social-historical history, in particular that of the Kulturkampf. The chapel is of architectural importance as a representative of a neo-Gothic chapel built on an upper floor and because of the relatively rich execution for convent chapels; the chapel as an example of the phenomenon convent chapel represents rarity value. The name of the architect is - on stylistic grounds - very probably that of Joh. Kayser, the height and detailing of the chapel are remarkable. The stained glass windows made in the workshop of Hertel & Lersch in Düsseldorf, dating from 1896, are of particular historical and aesthetic quality. The convent, the convent chapel and the school together are of cultural-historical value and represent public interest which is further expressed by the design refinement, the high siting and the landscape setting.