Woonhuis, Schiedamseweg 53

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

Monumental TOWN VILLA with spacious surrounding garden and wrought-iron FENCING built in 1883-84 commissioned by Vlaardingen shipowner A.H.C.M.J. IJzermans. According to accounts, the Eclectic design of the villa was produced by the client himself.

NB After the Second World War, the villa was extended on the west side, at the location of the original conservatory, with a simple, likewise white-rendered, annex of two storeys under a hipped roof with zinc cladding. Between 1916 and 1922, the villa, which had meanwhile been rebuilt, served as an outbuilding of the Rotterdamsche Bankvereeniging. Subsequently the villa was used until 1991 as a bank building for the firm R. Mees en Zoonen, later the bank Mees en Hope. Since 1991 a law firm has been established in the villa.

Description

The villa, constructed on a square plan, comprises a basement, a principal floor and a high attic storey under a mansard roof clad with zinc lozenges. The villa is entirely white-rendered above a high natural stone plinth and provided with rustication. The western bays are accentuated by means of fluted pilasters. The front facade of the villa has a symmetrical layout with a tower-like central projection in which the entrance is located on the principal floor with overlying balcony and adjoining 'tower room' furnished with a high truncated tent roof. The window and door frames of the (sash) windows and doors are of wood and all executed with moulding. The plinth is interrupted on either side of the entrance just above ground level by two arched basement windows with keystone-shaped lion heads in the archivolts. The windows are provided with wrought-iron grilles. The entrance, situated beneath the balcony, is reached via a high, seven-step natural stone stoop and has a landing and bronze handrail and consists of a double panel door and a semicircular fanlight. To the left and right of the entrance are facade stones with inscriptions respectively on a cartouche: 'ANNO' and '1883'. The entrance is flanked by two columns with composite capitals, which carry the hood with the overlying balcony. On the inside of the columns, on the basement to the right stands the text: 'The first stone laid on 23 July 1884' and on the left: 'By Gertrude Arnolda Josefa Maria IJzermans, aged 8 months'. On either side of the entrance, between decoratively worked pilasters likewise with composite capitals, are two high sash windows with fanlight and a surround in the form of a head-dress. Beneath the windows, between rendered blocks, eight balusters of blind balustrades are applied as facade decorations, conforming to the open balustrade of the balcony above the entrance. In the attic storey, in the more elevated central projection, is a double balcony door framed with pilasters, head-dress and a pediment with decoratively worked tympanum. The balcony door is flanked by two pilasters. The balcony has a white stuccoed balustrade. The central volume has above a moulded cornice a high roof with on the south, west and east sides a decorative circular light. The roof is crowned by a pyramidal finial with wrought-iron weathervane. On either side of the balcony in the roof panel two aedicula-shaped dormer windows. In the side facades the layout and rich decoration of the front facade are continued over one bay. The remaining parts are kept fairly plain. In the western side facade a dormer window and in the eastern side facade two dormer windows, both are aedicula-shaped conforming to the front facade. The rear facade has two basement windows and on the principal floor five simple sash windows and in the roof five dormer windows conforming to the front facade. In the interior of particular importance are the very richly, in stucco decorated draught vestibule and hall with the original Neo-Baroque style executed stucco ceilings, window and door surrounds, marble floors and wall panelling; the monumental oak staircase with landings and very finely carved woodwork in the spindles of the handrail; the stucco ceiling in the most western front room; the marble staircase to the basement with bronze handrail; the tiled floor in the basement hall and the LIPS safe in the eastern part of the basement. The garden is separated from the street by wrought-iron fencing with spear and pointed finials between masonry pillars with pyramidal caps and on a masonry foundation wall.

Valuation

Town villa built in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, and very richly designed, in Eclectic style, with partly well-preserved interior in Neo-Baroque style, surrounding garden and wrought-iron fencing, of general interest because of architectural and cultural-historical value, as well as of interest on account of image-determining and ensemble value with other villa development on the Schiedamseweg.