Delft is a city and municipality in South Holland in the
Netherlands, located on the Schie, between The Hague and
Rotterdam. On August 1, 2020, the
municipality of Delft had 103,037 inhabitants. Delft is the capital
of the Delfland water board. The municipality is part of the
Rotterdam The Hague Metropolitan Area.
Delft has a historic
city center, developed into an industrial city in the 19th century
and nowadays presents itself with the presence of a Technical
University and the research institutes TNO and Deltares, especially
as Delft City of Knowledge with the slogan Creating History.
Delft is best known in the history of the
Netherlands because William of Orange resided there from 1572 and
was murdered there in 1584. Since then, the House of Orange has
traditionally been interred in Delft. Delft's nickname is the
Princes' City. The patron saint of the city is Hippolytus of Rome.
Delft originated from a dug watercourse, the 'Delf', and is also called after; to dig means to dig. On the elevated place where this 'Delf' crossed the creek wall of the silted up river Gantel, a count's vroonhof was established, probably since the 11th century. Partly because of this, Delft was an important market center, which can still be seen in the size of the central market square.
Count Willem II granted Delft city
rights on April 15, 1246. Trade and industry flourished there. In
1389 the Delfshavensche Schie towards the Maas was dug, at the mouth
of which the seaport Delfshaven was built.
Until the 17th
century, Delft was one of the major cities of the county (later
province) of Holland. In 1400, for example, the city had 6,500
inhabitants, making it the third largest city, after Dordrecht
(8,000) and Haarlem (7,000). In 1560, Amsterdam had grown into the
largest city with 28,000 inhabitants, followed by Delft, Leiden and
Haarlem, each of which had about 14,000 inhabitants.
In 1536,
a large part of Delft was reduced to ashes by the great city fire of
Delft.
Prince William of Orange resided for a short time in
Delft, in the former Saint Agatha Monastery, which has since been
called Prinsenhof. He was murdered there on July 10, 1584 by
Balthasar Gerards. The city occupied a prominent position in the
field of printing.
Various Italian potteries established
themselves in the city and introduced a new style. The carpet
industry also flourished with François Spierincx. In the 17th
century, Delft experienced a new heyday due to the presence of a
Chamber of the VOC and the manufacture of Delftware.
In 1654,
much of the city was destroyed by the Delft Thunderclap - the
explosion of a gunpowder store on the site of the Paardenmarkt ever
since. At the 'distance of a cannonball' a new Powder House was
built by architect Pieter Post.
Several painters were active
in the city, such as Leonard Bramer, Carel Fabritius, Pieter de
Hoogh, Gerard Houckgeest, Emanuel de Witte, Jan Steen, and Johannes
Vermeer. Reinier de Graaf and Antonie van Leeuwenhoek received
international attention for their scientific research.
From the Dutch disaster year 1672, the Delft economy
declined. The city was overshadowed by the two neighboring cities of
The Hague (as an administrative center) and Rotterdam (as a port
city). Around 1670 there were some thirty factories in Delft, which
operated the pottery industry for a shorter or longer period of
time. In 1794 ten were still active. In the 19th century there was
only one pottery left: De Porceleyne Fles; this company was the only
one that could continue to exist because it also started producing
bricks in addition to pottery.
In 1850, the then municipality
of Delft, with an area of 5.3 km², had 18,642 inhabitants.
With the erosion of the city walls in the 19th century and the
arrival of the train in 1847, Delft once again became an attractive
place for new industries such as the Gist and Spiritus factory
(later Gist-Brocades, now part of DSM), Calvé and Delft Instruments.
The founding of the Royal Academy (now: Delft University of
Technology) in 1842 and the TNO research institute in 1932 ensured
that Delft also became a center of technology and science.
On
January 1, 1921, the neighboring municipalities of Vrijenban and Hof
van Delft were dissolved and a large part added to Delft. This
considerably expanded the territory of Delft.
After the
second World War
The first part after the Second World War in
which Delft was built is the area between the canal, the Schie
through Delft and the main road from The Hague to Rotterdam.
In the 1960s, Delft was expanded considerably, especially in a
southerly direction. There, the high-rise neighborhoods Poptahof and
Voorhof and the slightly less ambitiously set up Buitenhof rose
successively. From the 1980s, the Tanthof district was developed
even further south. Tanthof-East has an unclear street plan.
Tanthof-West still has the same design as Tanthof-East, but there
are more large single-family homes. Tram line 1 to Tanthof was
extended to improve public transport.
Due to the development
of Voorhof and Tanthof, the residential function of Delft shifted
more from the historic city center on one side of the railway to the
other side of this railway. The In de Hoven shopping center located
there is an important factor in this.
Higher education is increasingly concentrated around the TU
campus, for example, branches of Hogeschool InHolland and Haagse
Hogeschool have been built next to the TU campus. On May 13, 2008,
the entire high-rise building of the Faculty of Architecture
(education) of the Delft University of Technology burned down within
12 hours. Elsewhere on campus, housing was later found for this
faculty.
With the adoption of the Technopolis zoning plan, a
start was made in 2005 in the south-east of Delft on the development
of the TU Delft Science Park, where knowledge institutes, start-ups
and international companies are located.
Construction of the
Harnaschpolder began in 2009 after part of the polder was
transferred to Delft by the municipality of Midden-Delfland in 2004.
A total of approximately 1,300 homes will be built in
Harnaschpolder.
Around 2009 the construction of the railway
tunnel through Delft started. This serves to replace the railway
viaduct that ran just west of the city center. The two-track viaduct
was considered a bottleneck for rail traffic, caused noise nuisance
and separated the inner city and the residential area to the west of
it. The railway tunnel was provided with an underground station and
bicycle shed. An office building with a retail function was built
above ground that partly serves as a municipal office. The new
railway tunnel with the underground station was put into use on
February 28, 2015, after which the railway viaduct was demolished.
In 2017, the municipal office was officially opened. The total
investment costs for the city office were € 82.3 million.
Partly due to area development projects of the municipality, large
financial deficits arose in the municipal budget in 2014. Delft
asked for financial help from the province of South Holland and the
government. The realization of the project resulted in a loss of
tens of millions of euros for the municipality of Delft. In response
to the large losses, the city council has implemented cutbacks and
further increased local taxes. In 2016, Delft was the municipality
with the highest housing costs in the Netherlands among the larger
municipalities. In 2016, the financial problems came to an end and
the municipality announced that it would reduce the costs again.
For the future, further redevelopment of the
railway zone on the western border of the city center is in the
pipeline. The entire station area must be completed by 2023. This
area will continue to exist under the name Nieuw Delft.
Between the beginning of 2018 and the end of 2019, the Sint
Sebastian Bridge, weakened by damage to the foundation, will be
replaced by one suitable for heavy traffic and trams.
Coat of
arms and flag of Delft
The coat of arms of Delft consists of a
silver shield containing a vertical black bar, often depicted with
waves in it. This bar represents a canal ('delft'). This ancient
coat of arms was officially established in 1816 by the Supreme
Council of the Nobility.
The municipal flag consists of 3
horizontal bands, of which the inner one is black and the outer one
white. The flag was only officially adopted by the city council in
1996 but was used centuries ago, for example on the Delft ships of
the VOC.
The proportion of men aged between
20 and 30 stands out in the Delft population structure. In 2002 this
share was approximately 100% higher than the Dutch average. The
proportion of men between 20 and 24 is even almost 3 times the
national average (2014). The proportion of women in the same age
group was about 25% higher than the national average. The cause of
these differences is undoubtedly the presence of Delft University of
Technology, which mainly offers studies that are traditionally
popular among men.
Administrative division
Delft is
divided into 13 districts:
District 11 - Inner city
District
12 - Vrijenban
District 13 - Hof van Delft
District 14 -
Voordijkshoorn
District 16 - Delftse Hout
District 22 -
Tanthof West
District 23 - Tanthof East
District 24 - Voorhof
District 25 - Buitenhof
District 26 - Abtswoude
District 27 -
Schieweg
District 28 - Wippolder
District 29 - Ruiven
The Poptahof part (neighborhoods Poptahof-North and South),
sometimes seen as a separate district, is part of the Voorhof
district (Delft).
The Harnaschpolder neighborhood is not a
neighborhood, but part of the Voordijkshoorn neighborhood.
The
part of Delft where the railway viaduct has been replaced by an
underground tunnel was named Nieuw Delft.
Delft
has a historic city center. The canals Oude Delft and Nieuwe Delft
run parallel and roughly in a north-south direction. The latter is
better known as Lange Geer, Koornmarkt, Wijnhaven, Hippolytusbuurt
and Voorstraat successively.
Between these two canals, on
what is probably the oldest built-up location in the city, is the
Oude Kerk with its characteristic tower. That tower is called the
'Oude Jan'. Near the Oude Jan are the Gemeenlandshuis van Delfland
with a Gothic facade and the Prinsenhof.
To the east of the two canals, the city expanded over the
centuries. On the Markt, a very spacious square, is the Nieuwe Kerk
with the mausoleum of William of Orange and the royal burial vault.
The tower of the church is the second highest church tower in the
Netherlands. Also on the Markt, opposite the church is the Delft
town hall, which was built by Hendrick de Keyser in 1618-1620 around
the oldest building that Delft still has today: a tower called the
Oude Steen. On the Markt is a statue of Hugo de Groot, the legal
scholar who was born in Delft in 1583.
The Beestenmarkt is
the entertainment center of Delft, especially in summer, but there
are also plenty of catering establishments in other places near the
Markt - especially on the route Burgwal, Brabantse Turfmarkt,
Kromstraat, Markt, Nieuwstraat.
The history
of Delft shows that beer has been very decisive for the (economic)
growth of the city.
In many medieval cities, the use of water
required a choice of two main sources of income: the brewing branch
or the cloth industry. Those were two conflicting interests; beer
needed a lot of clean water, while the cloth makers and tanners
polluted the water to a great extent. In Delft, people largely opted
for brewing beer, because beer was considered the best drink for the
common people. The wealthy mostly drank wine; this was an affordable
drink for them. Milk was hardly consumed at the time, as many were
lactose intolerant and the milk spoiled quickly.
When brewing
beer, good quality water benefits. Water was abundant in the canals
of Delft. To meet the purity requirements of the water, this water,
which was slightly acidic, was obtained from the peatland north of
the city. These peat soils turned out to be suitable not only for
the extraction of peat as fuel, but also for the cultivation of the
grains required for the beer and the gruit still used at that time.
In order to prevent pollution of the canal water, it was decided
that discharge into the canals was no longer allowed, but that the
latrines would from now on be emptied into cesspools. However, in
the eastern part of the city there was also an old leather and
textile industry. The two kinds of waters were separated by means of
all kinds of closures.
The brewers were united in a guild,
which also determined the beer quota to give the small brewers a
chance to survive. The maximum production was 155 liters per week.
However, large brewers bought the unused quota from the smaller
brewers, sometimes even buying out small brewers. Later in the 16th
century, the quotations were relaxed, so that more small breweries
died. Still, beer production rose to around 155,000 barrels in 1514,
while by 1554 it had already risen to over 500,000 barrels, 80% of
which was for export.
The many breweries in the city not only
produced for the local population, but beer was also exported to
Zeeland and Flanders. Around 1550, Delft was the largest beer
producer in Holland.
Beer brewing spawned many ancillary
activities, such as the coopers making beer barrels, the need for
porters for the supply of raw materials and transport of the barrels
through the city, transporters with boats for the beer to be
exported, beer merchants and innkeepers.
Large brewers earned
so much around 1500 that they could afford to provide their houses
with natural stone façades, such as Jan de Huyter. Many of these
houses can still be recognized by the details, both in the interior
and the exterior. These buildings are located on the two main canals
of Delft: Oude Delft and Nieuwe Delft running parallel to it.
The Eighty Years' War caused the sales markets in the Catholic
Southern Netherlands to decline and due to competition from the beer
producing Rotterdam and Haarlem, the number of breweries fell
sharply from over 80 in 1600 to 17 in 1670, while in 1740 only ten
were active. Drinking habits had also changed, because people
started to use tea, coffee and cocoa and wine became affordable for
many Delft residents.
Names from the heyday of Delft beer
were: Pharao, Israel, Moselair and Delftsche kuyte.
Platter
bakeries were established in many old breweries, because a lot of
equipment could still be reused and the space for this was
functional, and the historical names were often maintained, such as
the Griex A and De Dissel. The last operating brewery in Delft was
the Gekroonde 'P' (previously the Gekroonde 'B' and before that Het
Vliegend Hert), which was in operation until 1922.
Since 2011, Delft has had its 'own' City Brewery again, listening to the name "Koperen Kat", named after the traditional copper stills in which beer was brewed, combined with part of the surname of the founder Rolf Katte. This brewery, located on the Schieweg, brews more than 12 types of beer, mainly served by local catering establishments. Due to its expanding success, partly because it is also for sale in the supermarkets of the Delft region and its popularity among Delft students, the brewery is growing in production from once 1000 liters per six weeks to 9000 liters per month.
Monumental buildings
Delft town hall
Waag (Delft)
East gate, city gate from around 1400
Municipal
House
Girls house
Saint Barbara Monastery
The Coat of arms
of Savoy
Koornbeurs, former meat hall
Powder house
Molslaan
104
Windmill De Roos
Sint-Huybrechtstoren
Water tower Delft
Rietveld Tower
Churches and other religious buildings
Genestet Church
Maria van Jessekerk
New Church with the
mausoleum of William of Orange and the Sepulcher of Orange-Nassau
Old Catholic church at the Bagijnhof
Old church
Sultan Ahmed
Mosque
St. Hippolytus Chapel
Synagogue
Church of Peace or
Sacrament Church
Zuiderkerk
Courtyards
Four courtyards
remain in Delft of the seven that the city once had. These are the
Hofje van Gratie, the Hofje van Pauw, the Klaeuwshofje, the Hofje
van Almonde. In addition, there are also modern courtyards such as
the Huigh de Groothof.
Other sights
Agnetapark
Bagijnetoren
Botanical Garden TU Delft
Market
East gate
Prinsenhof