Amsterdam, Hague and Delft School
The 1920s was the era of expressionism. In the Netherlands, the so-called brick expressionism of the Amsterdam School became especially popular, and its more sober variants of the Hague and Delft Schools. In Zoetermeer, this type of architecture can be found mainly in the Village and along the old access roads such as the Voorweg and Zegwaartseweg.
Amsterdam school
Architects of the Amsterdam School designed buildings in traditional materials, colors and techniques. But they broke with the tradition of vertical facades under a cornice, vertical and symmetrically distributed windows and tacked-on ornaments. With the Amsterdam School, facades are plastic and voluptuous, with great contrasts between open parts as windows and closed parts. Expression is mainly in windows, doors, cornices and unusual hood shapes. The windows are often horizontal, varying in shape and size and the decoration of the facade.
Hague School
The Hague School is closely related to the Amsterdam School, but more austere. Buildings are strongly horizontal, have rectangular shapes and faint hoods or flat roofs. The buildings resemble modernist. Sobered versions of the Amsterdam and The Hague School are known as the 1930s row house and the 1930s villa.
Delft School, traditionalism
The Amsterdam and The Hague Schools ceased to exist before the war, but the heavy brick architecture remained for a time, side by side with emerging modernism. Now there was no more modern expressionist construction, but rather conservative and subdued, based on the national building tradition of austere brick facades with a flat and symmetrical design. This style is known as traditionalism or the Delft School.
Examples
