Philipsdorp, factory housing as part of company policy

Gerard Philips studied under Sir William Thomson (later Lord Kelvin) at the University of Glasgow in 1886 aged 28. Originally a mechanical engineer trained at the Delft Polytechnic, Gerard Philips became very interested in the possibilities of artificial lighting. After gaining experience working in installation and sales, he decides his future is in manufacturing and sets up his own production plant for light bulbs. Funded by a loan from his father he buys an abandoned factory in Eindhoven on the city moat in 1891. This building was originally built as a steam powered nail factory in 1869. It became a buckskins factory from 1876. After a fire it was rebuilt in 1888 but quickly went into administration. Gerard Philips and his father Frederik started Philips & Co and manufactured incandescent light bulbs and carbon-filaments.

The tiny medieval city of Eindhoven at the confluence of the Dommel and Gender rivers was surrounded by 5 villages: Woensel, Tongelre, Stratum, Gestel and Strijp. Of these Woensel was the most important with more inhabitants than the neighbouring town. At the end of the 19th century the city attracted manufacturing, which was in part developed outside of the city limits on much cheaper land in one of the surrounding villages. Gerard's younger brother Anton Philips joined the company in 1899. After 1900 light bulb production quickly rose and the company needed more workers. For this the firm acquired the marshy land along the Gender opposite their first factory within the village of Strijp. This village would become the core of their activities in the following decades. A large new factory was built in 1909 (The Light Tower). As the company grew housing became an issue. There was little provision for factory workers, staff and researchers as most housing available in and around Eindhoven was very poor in quality. Housing provision by industrialists was small-scale, haphazard and ad hoc.

Anton Philips decided to set up a housing association: Thuis Best (best translated as "no place like home"). On the road linking Eindhoven and Strijp Philips acquires a large leasehold farm in 1909 with the aim to build workers housing here. The idea of a factory village incorporated the vision on the living conditions of the modern factory worker, such as a healthy dwelling, a kitchen garden, amenities and the workplace nearby. All amenities were to be located within the factory village e.g. company stores, industrial bakery, bath house, schools, sports pitches and music clubs. The aim was to provide a complete community, controlled by the employer to secure the loyalty of the workers to the company.

Gerrit Jan de Jongh was employed to draft the proposals for this new factory village. He drew plans for the streets, the positioning of the housing and the sewage system. This spatial plan was worked up into architectural drawings by others. G.J. de Jongh came from Rotterdam where he had gained a reputation as an urban planner for his work on the new harbour basins and the housing in Feijenoord and the Kralingse Bos. He had familiar ties to the company as his daughter Anna had married Anton Philips in 1898. Anton and Gerrit had visited Tuindorp 't Lansink and Port Sunlight for inspiration. They decided the factory village should have a relaxed village-feel with a lot of greenery to best accommodate the workers that mostly came from a rural background. Central (but spatially peripheral) in the design for the factory village is a large green with a football pitch, a small park and schools. Towards the train tracks allotments were made available.

Phase one was built directly next to the green with slightly curved streets named after women in the Philips family: Anna, Johanna, Henriëtte, Huberta and Elisabeth. The housing was designed by Louis Kooken, who was also responsible for the Volkssterrenwacht (Peoples Astronomical Observatory) and the Radiomonument. All housing was built in terraces of 4 or 8 with deep back gardens, but without front gardens. As a first for Strijp all houses were plumbed-in with gas and water and had a sewer connection. Phase 1 was completed in two building campaigns.

As a result of the great demand for housing, all houses in this first section had double the number of official residents by 1916, as families took lodgers and relations in. More housing was urgently needed. It would take until 1918 until the second building phase was completed. First the land that phase 1 wrapped around needed to be acquired by Philips. The streets until that time were cull-de-sacs of the Frederiklaan. After years of negotiations the industrialist Elias agreed to sell his field that was reached by a short dead end known as the Keerweerstraat (litterally: turn around street). On this land the Hulstlaan (Holly Lane) was laid out.

The houses along this street were intended especially for glass blowers that the company had brought in from elsewhere to work in the new glass factory on Strijp S. The houses on the Hulstlaan did have front gardens and a central reservation planted with trees. So did the roads along the "central" green where a small park, schools, a korfball pitch and a football pitch were built. This was part of a new vision on urban living in the rapidly urbanising villages around Eindhoven. The intention was to keep city dwellers connected with nature by bringing nature into the urban environment. for both aesthetic, and educational as well as recreational reasons. In 1920 the central city incorporated the adjoining villages to form Greater-Eindhoven.

Karel de Bazel was the man who was employed to design the subsequent expansion of the company village. He had worked with famous architects and had gained experience in social housing provision as the municipal architect of Bussum. His design for the Bredius Quarter were adapted for the next addition to Philipsdorp which was built from 1918 onwards. All housing was designed within a single aesthetic. The street was treated as an outdoor room with the facades of the buildings as the walls. This Berlagean concept doesn't differ much from typical Unwinesque urban design. The streets were named after trees, something that was started in the Hulstlaan. Streets named after trees were seen as more in keeping with the ideas of the garden village. In the Lindenstraat lime trees were planted. The name of the street thus corresponded with the natural element added.

De Bazel also starts work on the Area initially set aside for allotment. Here the cooperative bread factory (later ETOS an acronym of  Eendracht, Toewijding, Overleg en Samenwerking) was built in 1919. Behind it a small neighbourhood around a small square was developed. It is known as the Rowan Quarter after the central garden square named Lijsterbesplein. On the side of the park a double villa for engineers is erected.

The influence of Berlage is clearly visible in the layout of the forth building phase of Philipsdorp which  is built between the hamlet of Schoot, the village centre of Strijp and the large factory site known as Strijp-S. In 1919 De Bazel also submitted plans for this section of the factory housing project. His initial plan included a planned ring road that was never built here. Instead the Kastanjelaan (Chestnut Lane) is laid out is a wide avenue along the edge of the large factory site and the adjacent housing. This neigbourhood centres around a large garden square planted with London Plane trees; the Platanenplein (Plane Square). The houses are a copy of the housing in phase 3.

The final and fifth building phase includes the completion of the streets of the first two phases by developing an area known as De Bult (the heap) where until 1923 some slums had stood at the end of the Keerweerstraat. These houses were however not built by the company's housing associations, although the land was bought and provided to another housing association by the Philips Company. After 1920 on a triangle of land next to the factory site barracks were erected to house more glass blowers and their families. These were replaced in the 1930s by two schools: a company school and a technical college. On part of the terrain a public garden was planted, although this spot is known as the Essenplein (Ash Square).

Philipsdorp in Eindhoven-Strijp is dominated by the large football stadium built at the site of the original PSV pitch (1) in the small park (2) that has since been developed for housing and offices. On the edge of the community park the Philips School (3)  ULO school (4, a secondary school).On the edge of the company housing the Cooperative Bakery (5) was located. In several places ETOS shops (6) were to be located. Incidentally, all corner plots on the Frederiklaan were used as small shops. On a vacant lot  a small evangelical church was built (7) known as Van Prijt's Church.In the heart of the factory village a large M.T.S. or technical middle school (8) was built with beyond the multi-storey brick-modernist block of the Philips Company Training School (9), now a vocational college. The NatLab (10) was located on the edge of the factory site and housed the R&D department. Philipsdorp sits directly next to the old village centre of Strijp with the impressive Church of Saint Trudo. The Church of Saint Anthony (12), better known as the Steentjeskerk (Pebble Church) was built in 1919 as a daughter church of the St Trudo congregation.

Since 2010 the whole of Philipsdorp together with the other company village of Drentsdorp were given protected status as a conservation area. Both will be restored by the current owner a social housing association. As an important [part of the urban and industrial heritage of Eindhoven the city has designated Philipsdorp a listed area.The Elizabethlaan was torn down to make room for the enlargment of the stadium and a new thoroughfare.

Blossom Bonanza: for the botanical connoisseur

After a slow start nature has finally caught up with the times and springtime is in full swing. May is the month that many exotic trees and shrubs, and yes even bulbs and perennials show of their blooms against the emerging leaves. The Magnolias and Rhododendrons are well known examples, but these trees and shrubs are familiar to most people. Around this time there is more to be seen, if only one has a keen eye for the unusual or unexpected!

Fraxinus ornus, the Flowering ash, grows naturally from Hungary east into the Caucasus. The scented creamy white plumes (shown left) are nice to look at, but I personally don't like the smell. Styrax japonica is unknown to many, but these small trees are covered in dangling white blossoms (in the middle) that some find to resemble snowdrops. The warm weather and subsequent cold spell has caused the plant to flower profusely (on the right).

Wisteria (on the left) is known to many as it is a much-used ornamental climber. In most gardens it is grown against a wall or an a pergola. It naturally clambers up trees and the effect is incredible as the picture shows. Although most ornamental cherries have finished flowering. This Japanese Village Cherrie (Prunus 'Ukon') with its somewhat green, creamy-white flowers with a cherry-pink centre typically flowers later end of April or early May. Another Asian exotic is the Paulownia tomentosa with its very fragrant lilac flowers in large pinnacles (on the right). For these flowers it's known as the Foxglove Tree. An alternative name is the Royal Empress Tree, as it was named by Von Siebold in honour of Anna Paulovna, a Romanov princess who became Queen of the Netherlands by her marriage to William II.

Heveadorp, the remnants of social entrepreneurship

At present only a small portion of the old factory village survives. What remains is now protected. The factory village Heveadorp only pays lip service to the garden village in the architecture, the layout is a formal grid of three connected parallel streets.

The architecture is romantic in nature and refers to the good life in the countryside. The houses have been inspired by English Arts and Crafts architecture and is basically vernacular. Great attention was paid to provide a varied exterior and roofline to counteract the formal placement along the narrow streets.

Two rows of terraced cottages with large dormers and lunette-vaulted gable ends. The terraces have been designed as a single entity with no clear demarcation of the separate houses within each building. In the background a row of post-war terraced housing, in  the typical bland style of the 1980s.

The romantic English reference is achieved by the use of high chimneystacks. Vernacular Dutch chimneys are much lower and are never structural (never carrying the central roof beam).Here the chimneys are mostly ornamental and separate from the roof construction. The double cottage on the right has a plaque with "Borneo". Each of the 4 blocks of terraced cottages was named after one of the Indonesian islands where rubber was (and still is) produced.

The Middellaan (Middle Lane) forms the central axis of the factory village of Heveadorp. It follows an older dirt road that lead down to the Rhine where a ford was located just after the confluence of the Seelbeek brooke with that large river. The formal placement of the housing is clear as they are all built on the same building line along the narrow street.

One of the typically Dutch additions to the "English cottages" are these decorative awnings over the front door (shown left). The red ridge tiles are typical also for thatched cottages in the Netherlands. They make the roof more durable and also serve a decorative purpose here as the emphasize the outline of the variable roof shape. 

There are only three types of houses in Heveadorp. This is a terraced type with the front doors in a recessed entrance emphasised by a triangular gable end overhead. Originally these cottages stood on the street. The green was created in 1985 when a new road was built lower on the slope.

The executive cottages and villas have been built in a similar vernacular style as the workers cottages. Some are still standing on the south side of the former rubber factory site.

An example of 1950s and 1960s architecture. These terraces were built next to the old factory village to provide roomier accommodation and replace some of the war-damaged cottages. These sections of Heveadorp have not been given conservation status.

Heveadorp, model factory housing

The village of Doorwerth in Guelderland was located on higher ground along the road connecting the once fortified cities of Wageningen and Arnhem near the eponymous Castle Doorwerth. The name translates as Thornworth and is a reference to the local floodplain of the Nether-Rhine that had thorny shrubs (read Hawthorn) growing on it. At the end of the seventeenth century the lord of the manor acquires two farms in the valley of the Seelbeek. This brook runs down the moraine crest of the Veluwe Massif. From 1700 onward the valley became the furthest extent of the manor. In 1888 both the valley of the Seelbeek and the Duno Estate are sold to Jonkheer Scheffer (a lord), who built a model farm called Huis ter Aa (House on the Stream). This idealist enterprise eventually went bankrupt so in 1914 both the valley and the estate are bought by industrialist Odo van Vloten. He decides to keep the estate De Duno with its magnificent views across the river Rhine, but sells the land of the model farm to Dirk Frans Wilhelmi in 1915.

Wilhelmi owned a rubber factory. His Heveafabriek was named after the Rubber Tree (Hevea brasiliensis) and produced consumer goods such as tires and rubber boots. Like Van Vloten, Wilhelmi was a social entrepreneur avant la lettre. So in 1916 he founds a model village named Heveadorp (Rubber village). In de following decades this factory village grows to 83 terraced cottages for workers, 14 detached villa's for staff members, a small school, a local shop and a farm (the remnants of Huis ter Aa) . Most buildings were designed in a romantic English vernacular style in red brick with thatched roofs and high chimneys. Each block was named after one of the Indonesian Islands: Celebes, Sumatra, Java and Borneo. Here the most important rubber plantations were located where Dutch industrialists procured their rubber.

The sloping terrain was terraced to aid development. The workers cottages are built north of the factory site, whilst the villa's are mostly concentrated on the lower slope near the river Rhine. Between the main factory site -on a high flat terrace- and the harbour on the Rhine, more factory buildings were located on a narrow strip between the road and the Seelbeek brook. The present village of Doorwerth higher up on the moraine crest came into existence from 1923 onwards with the building of a new through road connecting Kievitsdel and Westerbouwing. So at present the village of Doorwerth is located north of Heveadorp, whereas it used to be located near the castle at the foot of the moraine crest.

Heveadorp was a typical factory village with the production site at the heart of the layout. Although English in appearance, the set-up was more inspired by German examples, for instance by Krupp in Essen rather than by the Garden City Movement. Garden city ideals were condensed into a romantic notion of rural living to enhance the lives of factory workers. This was mainly expressed in the architecture of the buildings and the presence of front and back gardens. Heveadorp lacks any Unwinesque spatial devices.

Heveadorp around 1935, with at its heart the large rubber plant (F). To the east the Seelbeek (S). In the well pond (W) where this brook rises one of the farms added to the manor of Doorwerth once stood. The factory village (V) was developed along a per-existing country lane. To the north the primary school (P) was built, whilst further south a technical school (T) was located. At the mouth of the brook a watermill (M) stood near a small harbour (H) and a Turnpike station (TS). The model farm Huis ter Heide (HtH) was maintained with the vegetable gardens further up the slope.

As Heveadorp is located with the area that saw heavy fighting during the Battle of Arnhem, the model village suffered badly. It was partly rebuilt in original style between 1948 and 1955. After the Hevea factory was taken over by another rubber producer Vredestein plans were made to expand the village. Instead new housing was built in Doorwerth with modernist blocks nestling in a former forest -a type of urbanisation inspired by the German Waldsiedlung. By the end of the 1970s the factory is considered no longer viable, as it is located on a sloping site, with little room for expansion, isolated from main roads and railways. The factory is dismantled and from 1984 the site is redeveloped for housing. These houses are typical of the period and very bland in comparison to the original model village. Heveadorp thus ceases to be a factory village and is made an out-quarter of Doorwerth. In 2010 Heveadorp officially becomes the sixth village within the Municipality of Renkum complete with its own postcode. The village now has 780 residents.

At present the old factory village makes up only a small section of the village of Heveadorp. The model farm was incorporated into the factory buildings in the 1960s, so now only the vegetable gardens remain (as a plant nursery).History was wiped out as was the norm in 1980s Netherlands...