The Golden Age

In the 17th century the Netherlands was the richest trading nation in Europe. Its towns built canals, narrow gabled houses and town halls in a restrained, classical style.

Amsterdam’s canal belt was laid out from 1613, with narrow houses of brick and stone whose gables face the water. Jacob van Campen’s town hall in Amsterdam, begun in 1648 and today a royal palace, and the Mauritshuis in The Hague show Dutch classicism.

In the Spanish Netherlands, today’s Belgium, churches were built in a rich Baroque, and after the bombardment of 1695 the Grand-Place in Brussels received its guild houses with gilded gables.