Rijnhuizen

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

Component 2

Description

HISTORIC GARDEN AND PARK LAYOUT. Originally a formal garden and park layout, which in the 18th and 19th centuries was landscaped in phases. It seems likely that the construction of the present house around 1640 was the occasion for an initial layout. On the castle there is a map, which must be dated to the second half of the 17th century or possibly the first half of the 18th century and on which the initial layout of the gardens may be depicted. The moated complex on this map is surrounded by a geometric garden layout, a large vegetable garden, a star wood and an orchard. The various garden sections are separated from one another by means of planted avenues and watercourses. This extensive formal avenue and watercourse structure, which was characteristic of the mid-17th-century layout of Rijnhuizen, is still visible today in the presently landscaped park. The most important and characteristic avenue of this system runs parallel to the north-south oriented forecourt and currently forms the eastern boundary of the country estate. It is a particularly long drive or promenade, planted with oak trees, which is closed off at the road by an ornamental spear fence. The actual drive to the forecourt is a transverse axis planted with chestnuts which stands at right angles to this avenue at the level of the castle. The moated main building lies centrally within the layout and is connected by means of an arch bridge to the elongated forecourt, to which both outbuildings are located in line. The access to the bridge is marked by two old chestnut trees. Centrally in the left and right part of the forecourt a bed with a (monumental) solitary specimen, an ash and a linden tree, the latter recently fell (1999) and was replaced by a new specimen. The landscaping of the gardens presumably began in the second half of the 18th century, in the period when the castle was also modernised at the command of the then owner Jan Jacob de Geer. The castle moat was partly dug out during this period into the landscaped pond as it still exists today. The parterre de broderie west of the castle gave way to a lawn, furnished with groups of trees and solitary specimens and bordered by parkland, which still largely exists. The present tree stock of the park dates partly from this period, which includes among others beeches, chestnuts, a swamp cypress, a plane tree and a large azalea. Around this terrain a walk was laid out, which leads around the lawn and along the tea house. The large vegetable garden to the southwest of the castle was still in use until this century, but received a new purpose in the last quarter of the 20th century. The orchard south of the vegetable garden still exists. In the landscaped, former star wood south of the castle, in the 1960s the laboratories of the FOM foundation were built, the forest that was preserved has become very overgrown.

Valuation

The HISTORIC GARDEN AND PARK LAYOUT belonging to the country estate Rijnhuizen is of general importance:

- because of the formally recognisable avenue and watercourse systems incorporated in the landscaped layout from the 17th and 18th centuries;

- because of the well-preserved forecourt;

- because of the castle moat dug out into a landscaped pond;

- because of the presence of monumental avenue plantings and solitary specimens from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries;

- because of the functional-spatial coherence with the other components of the country estate.