Every design for Heemstede

Heemstede grew up around a castle built overlooking the river Spaarne in the thirteenth century, and its name appears even earlier, around the year one thousand, meaning a place to live. It has lived up to that ever since: a town on an old coastal ridge just south of Haarlem, where people have come to settle and stay.

Wandelbos Groenendaal, laid out by joining several country estates into one, is where Heemstede goes for its Sunday walks. Those estates were built by wealthy families from Haarlem and Amsterdam who escaped the summer stench of the city canals, and some, like Hartekamp, still stand. George Clifford lived at Hartekamp and brought Carl Linnaeus here to catalogue his gardens. De Naald, a slender monument, honours Witte van Haemstede, who saved Haarlem in battle in the Middle Ages. To the north, much of the Haarlemmerhout forest once belonged to Heemstede before it went to its larger neighbour. Even centuries ago, Heemstede already had its reputation as the place where city people chose to make their homes.

On the map it comes down to lanes of old trees, the woods of Groenendaal, and that one thin needle of stone standing among them.