It’s like Downtown Abbey meets the Gilded Age meets middle Netherlands – a super cool mashup of a rich family’s personal life meeting the architect of Amsterdam (more on that in a minute), and creating a beautifully maintained property that is an absolute delight to tour.
Rams Woerthe is also the home of the Hendrick de Keyser Monumenten, which is downstairs, and also worth stopping to check out. Neither space is huge, so it’s a fairly relaxed afternoon to see it all, and it’s centrally located inside this giant park in Steenwijk – just a few blocks from the canal so you don’t even need a bike really. I had no idea that Hendrick was a preeminent Dutch sculptor and architect, crucial in transitioning the local style from late Renaissance Mannerism to early Baroque Classicism.
As Amsterdam’s city stonemason and architect, he is celebrated for designing several of the city’s key landmarks, including the Zuiderkerk and Westerkerk, and the monumental tomb of William the Silent in Delft. (yah, I got this from Gemini, I hadn’t even heard of Hendrick until we got to the museumhuis and they had his stuff there too).
