Every design for 'S-Gravenzande

's-Gravenzande grew up on a sandbank just north of the old mouth of the Maas, sheltered by a hook-shaped beach ridge, and today it sits on the western edge of the Westland with only a narrow strip of dunes between it and the North Sea.

Monster lies to the north, Naaldwijk to the east, and Maasdijk and Hoek van Holland to the south, where the boundary runs behind the Staelduinse Bos. Hoek van Holland itself once belonged to 's-Gravenzande, until the growth of Rotterdam's port claimed it. Market gardening made the place prosperous and filled its streets, and it is now the largest town in Westland. Long before that, Count Floris IV kept a residence on the sandbank, his widow Machteld van Brabant founded a chapel and gave it a statue of Mary that drew pilgrims, and in 1246 the town received its charter, making it the only place in the Westland with the rank of a town. A Dutch map of New Netherland even shows a 'Gravesant' where Gravesend in Brooklyn now stands.

Solleveld & Kapittelduinen on the coast side, the Prinsenbos and the Oranjepark inland: they frame a town between sea and garden land, and carrying it with you means carrying both.