Historical Gardens

Sometimes one gets bored of all the threats that parks and designed landscapes undergo in the struggle with project developers and/or local governmental bodies. “Why do they not see the value of these places, especially in a densely populated country like The Netherlands, and why do they not comply to the rules?“, you would like to shout.

And then a story in which ironically the creation of a park is involved, makes you realize that things could be much, much worse. The city of Moscow is evicting people from their homes in the Rechnik area, claiming the homes have been built there illegally. Their homes were initially destroyed immediately, but a few days later the residents were given time to move out.

Mr. Luzhkov, the Moscow mayor, is determined to have the homes cleared, insisting that the land will be turned into a park and nothing else. Opponents claim that the area will be used by property developers. The park, they say, is just an excuse to clear the current dwellers from the area.

Rechnik started out in the 1950s, when gardening plots were given to workers on a nearby canal. Whether they were given the land temporarily or not seems to be unclear, but many workers built small homes there and consequently stayed. The problem now, according to the city, is that these workers sold these plots of land since. The new owners sometimes joined several plots and built grand houses there.  Some of the owners seem to have contracts proving they own the land.

The disturbing thing is that events like this could swing any way ‘government’ wants. Governing bodies can condone property developments until they decide not to do that anymore. Or decide to lift protecting measurements when ‘better’ opportunities arise. Sometimes the result is a park and many homeless people; sometimes the result is that a park is destroyed and some lucky people own a home in a beautiful environment (like the Ostafievo estate, where the garden is apparently used to build heavily guarded villas; and to focus on other regions: Marinehospitaalterrein, Overveen).

Brrr…

[via]

Things have been fairly quiet surrounding Beeckestijn the past year. To remind ourselves where things stand: last year, the decision was made to transfer the estate from the Velsen council to nature preservation society Natuurmonumenten. That could not be done directly, so Beeckestijn was transferred to a ‘middle-man’, the Dienst Landelijke Gebieden (DLG), a subdivision of the Ministry of Agriculture. The final transfer was expected to be done swiftly, reason for the future owners to announce a first presentation of the bright and shiny future in December.

The neo gothic ‘chapel’ at Beeckestijn is one of the remaining buildings that is mentioned on the map of 1772. Photo by HvdE.

December 2007, that was… Now, a full year later, the final transfer has not yet been finalised and DLG is still sole owner of the estate.

Meanwhile the council of Velsen agreed upon a new zoning plan (links to .pdf-file) for the area Beeckestijn is located in. And that zoning plan does make future developments of Beeckestijn as a self sustaining estate just a little bit more difficult.¹
At least, that is what a local paper concludes.² One of the plans of the future owners was to rebuild the orangery that was demolished after WWII, and use it as a tearoom with a terrace, maybe even a shop. This would surely attract visitors and bring in much needed money. The zoning plan now blocks that plan in two ways:

1. The plan states that no additional catering industry vending points are allowed in the whole zoning area, unless it is planned in the area surrounding Velserbeek, an estate more to the north of Beeckestijn. According to the plan Beeckestijn already has a bar/restaurant on its premises which could remain there, but that has been closed since late spring 2006.

2. The more decisive point in the zoning plan is this: the only reason the council will support a new structure to be built, is when it is mentioned on ‘the map of Michael (1772)’.³ This can only apply to Beeckestijn, although it is not mentioned as such in the text. Michael is the architect of Beeckestijn, or at least the head gardener and the one drawing the map of 1772. There is no other location that Michael drew a map of in 1772, as far as I know.

The orangery would have been located just on the other side of the hedge. Photo by HvdE.

The orangery is not on that map. And although the orangery has been around for some 150 years, the fact that it does not comply to that rather arbitrary criterion imposed on Beeckestijn by its former owners, one of the few new ‘cash-cows’ for the future owners of Beeckestijn has been denied, the local paper implies.

The local paper did not take another section of the zoning plan into account, though. In section 8.2, on page 55, it is stated that current owner DLG believes the zoning plan is too strict when it comes to Beeckestijn.⁴ The council says in response it still prefers the restrictive line it originally intended to take as far as building plans are concerned.
But. It also states that any future building plans will be examined closely by the council, which may result in a cooperative attitude from their side.

So all is not lost. But it may make the final transfer of the estate to its future owners a bit more difficult, I presume.

1. To be fair, it also creates room for extra developments that could make the garden more attractive to visitors. More about that in later posts. [back]
2. The IJmuider Courant brought that news today. [back]
3. Zoning plan section 7.3.3., page 22. [back]
4. Section 8.3 seems to be missing from the plan. [back]

Earlier this month, the first step in the transfer of Beeckestijn to its new owners was finally completed by the transfer of ownership from the Velsen council to the department of DLG.¹ It has taken all parties involved almost 6 months to agree on the terms and conditions under which the transfer takes place. It is now up to DLG and the designated owners (Vereniging Natuurmonumenten, Vereniging Hendrick de Keyser and one private financier) to finalise the full transfer and present the new plans.In early July the new owners stated they would have the plans for Beeckestijn’s future ready and present them at a first exhibition in December 2007. The fact that now only the first step in the process has been finalised is evidence that these talks are more difficult than originally expected.If one looks at the constellation of the new ownership, it is hardly surprising these talks have taken so long. Every party involved at the receiving end of the deal has their own ideas and preferences for the future of the estate. And because the estate is not sold but traded for development areas elsewhere in Velsen, the parties that are giving Beeckestijn away also have a say in its future. The parameters set by the ‘giving’ parties are:

• the estate should remain open to the public (Velsen council).
• the new owners must be able to maintain the estate in a sustainable way for a considerable time (the Province of Noord Holland).
• [there used to be a demand to maintain the unity between house and park, expressed by the Velsen council earlier in the process, but I do not see this anymore]

On the receiving end, the parties involved have already shown they are capable of working together, but their preferences are difficult to combine. They need to find a balance between the ecological relationships between the garden and surrounding area one the one hand, and the simultaneous creation of a museum of gardening on the other, all within the parameters the giving parties have set.No one’s saying this will be easy, but the first step has been made.

1. See for more information on the transfer and the organisations involved here, here and here. [back]

Dutch newspaper Volkskrant today reports about a Dutch garden architect who is active in Georgia, the former Russian province. The architect and his Dutch team have probably profited from the fact that the wife of the Georgian president is of Dutch origin. Martin Veltkamp, the architect, says the president himself ordered his consul in The Netherlands to find him a team who could make a design, and be ready on Independence Day, May 26 2007. Apart from some minor construction work, the team was able to meet that deadline.

Photo: Dadiani Palace, Zugdidi
Originally uploaded by tball01

The Dutch architects are currently working on projects in Tblisi, Georgia’s capital city. Their first realised project are is a ‘childrens rest park’ in the gardens around the Dadiani Palace Museum and botanical gardens in the western town of Zugdidi. Situated some 50 kilometers from the Eastern shore of the Black Sea, this town apparently boasts a tropical climate. President Saakashvili opened the ‘childrens rest park’ near the museum on Georgia’s independence day. For the park, trees from France and The Netherlands were brought in.

I hope to be able to give some more information about the actual plans, in the mean time we will need to make do with this photograph of what certainly is new plantation -but probably is not part of the new work in Zugdidi. Having looked at some of his work, it is probable Veltkamp only designed plans for a small portion of the park. Update @ September 10, 2007: there is a picture available here, together with information that the part Veltkamp worked on is 1.5 hectares in size.

Martin Veltkamp has been active since 1983 and is now rapidly becoming one of the most renowned garden architects of The Netherlands, at least one with a very international profile. In 2006 he opened an office in Dubai. One of the few examples of his work I have found (outside his own website) is this design for a house that was for sale in his hometown Bergschenhoek. If this is anything to go by (and seeing the examples on his website it probably is), Veltkamp designs geometrically structured gardens, with several almost secluded areas which all have their own use. In short: ‘cottage style with a rigid twist’ (and just pretend ‘rigid’ can ‘twist’). These areas are contained within and lined with hedges or other natural materials. For the details within these areas, high grade (read: luxury) materials are used.

According to a description in a local (Bergschenhoek) online newspaper, his aim is to design gardens with a minimum of maintenance and a maximum of pleasure. The owner/user of the garden should not be bothered by the design, the design –and subsequently the garden- should assist him in the entertainment of his guests (Veltkamp’s own website). We can see why he opened an office in Dubai, there should be a big market for his trade there.But Georgia? Well, we can’t blame the architect for trying. Update @ September 30, 2007: In the Volkskrant article Veltkamp states that he will have ten year’s worth of work, if the current government remains in power. Since the arrest of an opposition leader earlier this week by president Saakashvili has lead to widespread protests, the future is looking bleak for Veltkamp’s upcoming office opening on November 1st, 2007.

In a predictable turn of events, the arrangements surrounding Beeckestijn have led to questions in parliament (Tweede Kamer). Mrs. Snijder-Hazelhoff, member of parliament for the oppositional liberal party (VVD) and -according to her profile- dairy farmer in the northeastern part of The Netherlands, directed questions to the Minister of Agriculture (Gerda Verburg -CDA) on the legitimacy of the process, and whether other parties (read: market parties) have been considered in the process.

The last point should have been quite clear for someone with only the slightest grasp on the recent history of this estate: just over a year ago plans to sell the estate to a market party were blocked by both local and national politicians. I know we have had Italian-style changes in national and local politics in the past few years, but one would expect that someone would do some reading into a subject, before going public with questions like that.

However, one can see why she questions (pdf-link) the process followed in this case. As a farmer she must have dealt on a regular basis with the ministry of agriculture, and maybe its subsidiary Dienst Landelijke Gebieden (DLG -national service for rural areas) as well, and she might be worried. When local politicians were looking for a solution for Beeckestijn, DLG stepped in with a solution favourable to almost everyone: DLG would be taking over the estate and some surrounding grounds in exchange for areas in DLG’s possesion in Velserbroek, part of Velsen. In addition to that, Velsen would get the opportunity to use these new grounds as a development area, in which way they’d secure a bigger revenue for losing the estate than by just selling it to the highest bidder. In the mean time, Beeckestijn would be ‘passed on’ by DLG to nature preservation society Natuurmonumenten and partners, who declared they wanted to restore and maintain the estate. Everybody happy.

Except for the farmer whose land lies in Velserbroek, within the area given away by DLG as development plot. Continue Reading »

It is official: Beeckestijn as complete estate is saved (to the left: an image of only half the territory as pictured on the 1772 estate map by architect Johann Georg Michael).
Last Thursday evening (it only took them ten minutes) the Velsen council voted in favour of plans to exchange the estate against development plots elsewhere. This vote marks the end of over 5 years of uncertainty for the estate and the people involved. A lot of damage has been caused by the uncertainty: in the meantime the museum has closed and its collection has been distributed around the country. The garden is maintained on only a minimal level.

So the ambitious new owners have a lot of work cut out for themselves (see my two previous posts for more information about them). Their aim is to present a plan for a centre for garden and landscape architecture before the end of this year, and that will be a big task. The bottomline of today must be the fact that Beeckestijn will venture into a new period in its long history, though. Once again a period of hope commences.

(In my previous post I reflected on Beeckestijn as being eyed by two organisations -Cascade and Stichting Nationaal Tuinmuseum- in their efforts to create a garden museum in The Netherlands. Comments on the Cascade weblog indicate that they are currently not involved in talks about the future of Beeckestijn. To be continued, I’m sure.)

According to a report in Haarlems Dagblad, Beeckestijn will become a centre for garden and landscape architecture. A spokesman of Vereniging Hendrick de Keyser reportedly said as much in a meeting with the Velsen town council last Thursday. Later this year a they will present a plan, together with prospected co-owner Natuurmonumenten. Dutch garden history society Cascade have meanwhile teamed up with the Foundation for a Dutch National Garden Museum (Stichting Nationaal Tuinmuseum). Both organisations have cast an eye on Beeckestijn as a possible location for such a museum.

The Velsen town council is currently preparing a decision on the plan presented by the mayor and aldermen to exchange Beeckestijn against grounds nearby. The meeting of last Thursday must be seen as a step in that process. According to Haarlems Dagblad the council will probably agree with the plan. A decision is expected within a few weeks.

The mayor and aldermen of Velsen yesterday announced that they plan not to sell the estate Beeckestijn. Instead, they will exchange the estate against land currently owned by the National Agency of Rural Areas (Dienst Landelijk Gebied -DLG). DLG is part of the department of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality (Ministerie van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit -LNV). Included in the exchange are the recreational area and some pastures next to the estate. The local council will have to decide on this exchange within the next few weeks. Continue Reading »