Spoorwegstation

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

COPY STATION built in 1950 in a decorative 'shake-hands' architecture designed by Sybold van Ravesteyn (1889-1983) to replace the late nineteenth-century station destroyed by war damage and making use of (parts of) the pre-war platforms, platform canopies and masonry. Four polychromatic ceramic figures by Jo Uiterwaal (1897-1972) have been placed on the outer facades of the station in connection with the architectural concept and with representations referring to the railway connection and the province of Zeeland. The design was also influenced by Italian examples. The main building contains the hall and restaurant. In the western wing the bicycle storage. Compared to its predecessor, the new building closed more tightly on the east side to the Vlissingen-Breskens ferry, from which a large flow of passengers was expected. The front facade of the station was moved further north to provide a spaciously laid out traffic square with bus station at the front. Behind the station a detached service building from the construction period. In front of the entrance to the bicycle storage stands a natural stone flower box donated by the municipality with sculptured NS emblem and inscription 'Vlissingen 1950'.

Description

The STATION BUILDING is placed transversely on the terminal tracks and constructed in yellow brick with a recessed joint. The low facades are finished with a wide cornice painted in ochre. The front facade is characterized by two semicircular gables between straight-edged facade sections. The gables are accentuated by spheres on either side and shield-shaped ornaments on the tops. Under the left gable the entrance to the station hall. Under the right gable windows of the restaurant. In the middle of the front facade a clock in a decorative concrete surround. Around the southeast corner of the station, at the location of the restaurant and former waiting room, a narrow elevated terrace with low natural stone balustrade. The front facade is articulated by wide window and door sections in natural stone straight-edged surrounds, natural stone square fluted pilasters with a concrete cornice, and by stylized classical elements such as consoles below the cornice. The first and last bay of the front facade have vertical window sections with semicircular undersides and oversides in a decorative natural stone surround. Ceramic figures are placed against the semicircular gables on profiled natural stone consoles. The originally cream-coloured and now grey-coloured figures are provided with attributes of railways, agriculture and fishing, some of which are coloured in red, blue, yellow or gold. The western side facade is articulated by square fluted pilasters with a concrete cornice on either side of a raised central section beneath a segmental arch-shaped roof line. In the middle of the facade a polychromatic sculptural work of the coat of arms of Zeeland. In the southern corner of the west facade another vertical window section with semicircular undersides and oversides in a decorative natural stone surround. On the platform side the main building is finished by the reused rear facade of the late nineteenth-century predecessor, with decorative brickwork and matching detailed door and window sections. The western half of the main building contains the hall with barrel vault behind the gable and on the right side the - now closed - ticket offices with polished natural stone surrounds and the former baggage counter. The floor of the hall is laid with grey quartzite tiles and pink-red tiles in a grid pattern. The eastern half of the main building contains the restaurant and the now kitchen-designated former third-class waiting room.

In the western - slightly recessed - wing with three pentagonal windows the bicycle storage, of which the masonry on the interior belonged to the old station. On the south side these walls are clad with the yellow brickwork of the new station. The entrance to the bicycle storage is marked by a canopy with coffered ceiling on natural stone columns. The entrance and the adjacent window are semicircularly closed. To the left of the entrance section against the facade a polychromatic sculptural group, depicting a man and woman figure with attributes of railways and agriculture. In the rear facade of the bicycle storage the connection to the platform canopies is visible, with the arch for a third (unrealized) platform canopy within it. On the platform side the western wing is connected to a rectangular SERVICE BUILDING, possibly (partly) a remnant of the late nineteenth-century predecessor. Behind the bicycle storage a detached cross-placed single-storey SERVICE BUILDING in related design, on a high plinth and with wide roof overhang. On a section of the PLATFORMS (indicated on the attached map) still the late nineteenth-century wooden canopy on cast-iron columns with composite capitals.

Valuation

The elongated COPY STATION at Vlissingen is of general importance as a characteristic and last integrally preserved work by one of the most prominent station architects of the Netherlands in the mid-twentieth century, Sybold van Ravesteyn, for whose oeuvre the curved line and the application of visual art in connection with a clear spatial organization and a monumentality also inspired by Italian examples is characteristic, alongside careful detailing and materialization, both internal and external. The prominently situated station near the ferry harbour is also of great cultural-historical value because of its direct relation to the reconstruction task as restoration of the war destructions that the strategically located port city on the Scheldt underwent. The functional yet decoratively treated station building in yellow brick with pronounced surrounds in a classicist, symmetrical formal language is furthermore of great architectural-historical value as a well-preserved exemplar of a combining reconstruction architecture, in which components still spared by war damage are integrated into the concept. The image-defining railway station in Vlissingen with its striking silhouette is also of great urban planning-historical value as a marker of the beginning/end point of the only railway connection in Zeeland and the historically-functional relationship with the ferry harbour. The figurative-symbolic sculpture by Jo Uiterwaal is of great cultural and artistic-historical value as a conceptual component of the union of architecture and visual art and because of the craft-technical pioneer value because here polychromie in ceramics and firing in one piece was experimented with for the first time.