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03 · Renaissance, Baroque & Rococo

Dutch Renaissance

c. 1550–1700

Tall skinny brick canal houses competing gable by gable: stepped, bell, and scrolled tops trimmed in white stone.

Look for

Curved parapet gable Steep gable Sash window
Canals of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands: an example of Dutch Renaissance architecture
Canals of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Photo: Andrés Barrios, CC BY-SA 4.0
House with the Heads, Amsterdam, Netherlands
House with the Heads Amsterdam, Netherlands · RVD Koninklijk Huis, CC0
Vleeshal, Haarlem, Netherlands
Vleeshal Haarlem, Netherlands · This Photo was taken by Wolfgang Moroder. Feel free to use my photos, but please mention me as the author and send me a message. This image is not in the public domain. Please respect the copyright protection. It may only be used according to the rules mentioned here. This specifically excludes use in social media, if applicable terms of the licenses listed here not appropriate. Please do not upload an updated image here without consultation with the Author. The author would like to make corrections only at his own source. This ensures that the changes are preserved.Please if you think that any changes should be required, please inform the author.Otherwise you can upload a new image with a new name. Please use one of the templates derivative or extract., CC BY-SA 4.0
Antwerp City Hall, Antwerp, Belgium
Antwerp City Hall Antwerp, Belgium · No machine-readable author provided. Klaus with K assumed (based on copyright claims)., CC BY-SA 3.0
Delft City Hall, Delft, Netherlands
Delft City Hall Delft, Netherlands · Chris06, CC BY-SA 4.0

what it is

Dutch Renaissance architecture, also called Dutch Mannerism, applied Italian Renaissance ornament to the brick houses and public buildings of the Netherlands. Facades are red brick crossed by horizontal bands of white stone. Pilasters (flat columns attached to the wall), scrolls, obelisk-shaped finials and carved masks are used freely as decoration rather than as a strict classical system. The gable, the top of the facade facing the street, is the main feature: stepped gables rise in a series of steps, while scrolled gables have curved sides and a small pediment on top. Canal houses often have a hoisting beam at the gable for lifting goods to the upper floors.

In Amsterdam, Hendrick de Keyser designed the Zuiderkerk (1606-1611), the Westerkerk (1620-1631) and the Exchange (1608-1613), and he also designed Delft's city hall (1618-1620). Lieven de Key built the Vleeshal, a meat market in Haarlem (1602-1603). The Dutch classicism that followed, seen in the Mauritshuis in The Hague (1636-1641), used plain, strictly symmetrical facades with less applied ornament.

how to spot one

Curved parapet gable A gable end wall carried above the roofline as a parapet (a low wall) and cut into curves and scrolls. It is typical of Spanish mission churches and Mission Revival buildings. Steep gable The triangular upper part of an end wall, framed by the two slopes of a steep roof. Steep gables are common on Gothic Revival, Tudor Revival and Queen Anne houses. Sash window A window made of one or more glass-filled frames, called sashes, that slide up and down in grooves. It is standard on Georgian and Federal houses and common on Victorian buildings.

Also look for

QuoinsRoof finialCornice

history

The style reached the northern Netherlands from Flanders, where scroll gables first appeared in the second half of the 16th century. It grew with the Dutch Republic after the revolt against Spain, and many Flemish craftsmen moved north after Spanish forces took Antwerp in 1585. Lieven de Key (1560-1627), born in Ghent, worked in London from 1580 to 1591 and became Haarlem's city architect in 1592, when the city was still rebuilding after a fire in 1576 destroyed about a third of it. Hendrick de Keyser (1565-1621) became Amsterdam's city stonemason in 1595 and developed the local version, often called the Amsterdam Renaissance.

Work on Amsterdam's canal ring began in 1613, and merchant houses with stepped and scrolled gables lined the new canals. Netherlandish architects also worked abroad: the Flemish-born Anthonis van Obbergen designed the Great Armoury in Gdansk (1600-1605). From the 1630s, Jacob van Campen and Pieter Post turned to a stricter classicism, with symmetrical facades and full columns or pilasters, in the Mauritshuis and in van Campen's Amsterdam town hall (1648-1665), now the Royal Palace.

where to find it

Amsterdam's canal ring, Haarlem, and Delft, with echoes in Bruges, Gdansk, and older streets across northern Europe.

easy to confuse with

Dyckman Farmhouse, an example of Dutch Colonial Dutch Colonial A barn-profile gambrel roof, often flared at the eaves, sometimes with a split Dutch door. Maison Kammerzell, an example of Half-Timbered Half-Timbered Exposed oak skeletons filled with plaster: crooked black and white frames, overhanging upper floors, and steep roofs.