Last update of the year, and looking back at 2016

The last update of 2016 is another page about an architect, Jan Stuivinga. Another protestant architect who was active mostly in profane architecture, but with a few interesting churches none the less. Like the Lasonderkerk in Enschede as shown in the picture.

Now another year is ending, I'd like to look back at 2016. It was the first good year for this website since 2012, when private matters began to interfere with regular updates. 2013 began optimistically enough with one update in January, but the next update didn't come until May 2014, and that year saw only three more messages in this blog. It took me until November 2015 to find the time and energy to fully return, and I finished that year with five more messages posting updates on mainly older pages. 

In 2016 there were a total of 31 messages announcing many more updates, including this one, and with multiple updates in every month except for August. In some cases, several updates were made to the same pages and it's no use mentioning them all again. But a few numbers I'd like to mention:  

- There were 22 entirely new subject pages, 10 of which were about architects (including a few very important ones), 6 about a municipality (5 of them in the Utrecht province) and 4 about a specific church.

- Three more new pages were made about newly formed municipalities, replacing six older pages. 

- 9 pages about municipalities were improved with new pictures and information.

- 4 pages about specific churches were given new and better pictures. 

- 16 pages were translated, bringing the number of bilingual pages to 170.

And then there were many, many smaller but often important changes to older pages that I did not mention on this blog. Many more of these updates, but I'm sure also many bigger ones, will follow in 2017. See you next year!

Big Enschede update

The page about the city of Enschede, Overijssel province has been updated in such a way that it now covers almost every church of some architectural importance in the Enschede municipality. These include the churches of the villages of Boekelo and Glanerbrug, but also churches outside the city center. Fifteen objects were added, bringing the total number at twenty-seven.

A church in Gelderland

Today there's a new page in the Gelderland section, about the part Romanesque, part Gothic and part neo-Gothic St. Martinus church in Wehl.   

The last two Utrecht updates

For this year, that is, because I do intend to visit that province again next year. Two new pages, one about Veenendaal showing nine of that town's many (and mainly protestant) churches. Second, there's a page about the slightly curious but very old Reformed church of Werkhoven (see picture). 

En op Nederlandstalig vlak: er is een nieuwe tweetalige pagina over Veenendaal.

Utrecht updates again

Two more pages in the Utrecht section, this time about the municipalities Baarn and De Bilt. 

Another change is that I removed the Freefind search engine I had been using since forever. Unfortunately its free version is limited to 250 pages and Archimon is much bigger than that. I replaced it with Google which doesn't give me the excellent data Freefind gave me, but it works. 

Voor de Nederlandstaligen: er zijn nieuwe tweetalige pagina's over de gemeenten Baarn en De Bilt. De zoekmachine is vervangen door Google. Deze doorzoekt alle pagina's in Archimon en is dus ook in toenemende mate in het Nederlands te doorzoeken. 

More Utrecht updates

Two new pages today; one about the Utrechtse Heuvelrug municipality, and one about one of its churches, the St. Petrus' Banden in Driebergen-Rijsenburg (see picture).

Three pages renewed

Three pages about specific churches are improved. First, the page about the Reformed church in Doorn (Utrecht province) now has much better pictures of its northern side. The other two pages are about churches in Noord-Brabant; the St. Bavo in Raamsdonk, also with new pictures of its northern side, and the St. Gummarus in Steenbergen (shown above) with all new pictures for a complete walkaround.

New architect

Here's another new page about an architect; this time J.M. Hurks (1890-1977), architect of several churches in the western part of Noord-Brabant. Like the St. Joseph in Roosendaal in this picture.

Also, there are some improvements made to the pages about Dom Bellot and H.C. van de Leur. 

More Utrecht updates

A new page about some of the churches in the Soest municipality and some changes, including a new object, to the page about Zeist, which is now a municipality page. 

En voor wie alleen Nederlands kent: er is een nieuwe pagina over de gemeente Soest en een kleine aanvulling op de pagina over Zeist.

Utrecht updates

New pictures were added to the pages about the municipalities Bunnik and Houten, both of which I now consider complete. 

I have also added many new pictures of hitherto missing objects in the city of Utrecht. But instead of having them all on the same page, I made a seperate page for all churches outside the old city centre. 

Architects: Van Groenendael and Sluijmer

After a holiday absence of over a month, here's a few updates. New are pages about J.H. van Groenendael and N.J.H. van Groenendael, brothers of J.H.H. van Groenendael. During my research I found evidence that several churches commonly, and also by me in the past, attributed to J.H.H. van Groenendael were in fact designed by one of his brothers. This means the latter page is now corrected as well. Research was largely based on information found in newspapers from the period 1890-1942.

Also new are three pictures on the page about J.H. Sluijmer.

Zuid-Holland

De pagina's over de plaatsen Noordwijk en Lisse en de gemeente Teylingen zijn nu tweetalig. Deze pagina's zijn bovendien op diverse punten verbeterd en de laatste twee zijn daarbij iets uitgebreid.

Architects again

There's once again a new page about an architect. This time it's N. Molenaar jr., the architect of the church in the picture, the O.L. Vrouwe van Goede Raad in Honselersdijk. And not to be confused with his father N. Molenaar sr.. 

Also, there are new pictures on the pages about B.J. Koldewey, H. Kroes, G. van Hoogevest and J.G.A. van Dongen.

Even more architects updates

There are new pages about architects B.J. Koldewey and H. Kroes, the latter including a few words about his son W.C.A. Kroes. Also and a picture added to each of the pages about C.A. Hardeman and Th. Molkenboer.  

Gelderland updates

The page about Huissen is now replaced by a new page about the Lingewaard municipality. Also, the page about two churches in that municipality, the O.L. Vrouw van Zeven Smarten in Haalderen and the O.L. Vrouwe ten Hemelopneming in Huissen, have more and improved text. Also some changes to the page about Apeldoorn; one picture replaced and two churches added.

Nieuws in het Nederlands: 
De pagina over Huissen is vervangen door een nieuwe pagina over de gemeente Lingewaard. De pagina over Apeldoorn is uitgebreid met foto's en gegevens van twee kerken. Verder zijn vertaald de pagina's over Winterswijk en Oldebroek.

More architects updates

The biographies of G.M. Leeuwenberg, B.W. Plooij and E. Reitsma have been expanded. The latter two pages have a new picture each, as do the pages about A.J. Kropholler and C.M. van Moorsel. 

Pictorial indexes re-styled.

All the so-called pictoral indexes are re-styled to include captions for the pictures, replacing the small pop-up texts that stopped working ages ago. A cosmetic change, but very functional. As usual, clicking on a picture gives access to a page about that specific church. And as always, you find the links to the pictorial indexes at the main page. 

Some small architects updates

One new picture was added to each of the pages about architects H.C.M. van Beers, G. van Hoogevest, C.M. van Moorsel and E. Reitsma.

Zuid-Holland update

New in the Zuid-Holland section is a page about Rotterdam-Zuid, covering the part of Rotterdam south of the river Nieuwe Maas. Not complete by far, but a nice start with eight churches.

In het Nederlands: nieuw in de sectie Zuid-Holland is een (uiteraard tweetalige) pagina over Rotterdam-Zuid. Daarnaast zijn de pagina's over Rotterdam (met subpagina's Overschie en Hillegersberg), Giessenlanden, Gorinchem, Midden-Delfland en Westland vertaald.

Architects updates

A new page about C.M. van Moorsel was added, with for now a selective (churches and chapels only) list of works, a handful pictures but quite an extensive biography. 

Also some changes to the page about A. Tepe; some textual improvements, one older picture replaced and a missing object added, with picture. 

Noord-Brabant update

The page about Drimmelen municipality in the Noord-Brabant province is updated and now shows the hitherto missing churches in the eponymous village as well. Also text was updated to represent the current state of affairs.

En dat ook even in het Nederlands: de pagina over de gemeente Drimmelen bevat nu ook de kerken in het gelijknamige dorp. Verder is de tekst van deze pagina geactualiseerd.

More architect updates

There's a new page about yet another fairly unknown catholic architect, H.P.J. de Vries. 
Also, the pages about architects B.T. Boeyinga, Tj. Kuipers, E. Reitsma and W. te Riele each have a new picture, while on all some textual changes were made.

J.H. Sluijmer theme updates

The page about J.H. Sluijmer Sr. and his son J.H. Sluijmer Jr. has had a major update; extended biographies, a list of works that is close to complete, and a few pictures. And to stay with J.H. Sluijmer Sr., there's a completely new page about the St. Mauritius in Silvolde (see picture) and improved versions of the pages about the St. Isidorus in St. Isidorushoeve, the St. Jacobus de Meerdere in Enschede and the H. Bonifatius en Gezellen in Haaksbergen-Veldmaat.

New architect: H.C.M. van Beers

A new page about H.C.M. van Beers, an architect of catholic churches from 1924 until ca. 1960, was added today. Actually, the concept for this page has been on my hard-drive for several years for lack of biographal information, but since the list of works is nice enough I thought I might as well publish it. 

Page renewed: Breda, Ginneken (NB): St. Laurentiuskerk

Back in 2000, when I started Archimon, I used a Sony Mavica digital camera for all pictures. It needed 3.5" diskettes that each could contain just over 1 megabyte of data, which was about ten pictures. Utterly primitive compared to today's technology, but back then it made it possible for me to take thousands of pictures of hundreds of buildings in dozens of places and build hundreds of pages with them. Well, the scope of this website soon changed (back then I used to cover profane architecture too) and I took quite a few pages with particularly bad pictures down "for maintenance", some of which never to return, while the camera itself was replaced in February 2002 and many churches were revisited in the following years. It's a miracle some of these ancient pictures are still left on this website, let alone that there still is a whole page with them. Especially since I announced the replacement of the last page already in 2011. Obviously I was wrong. 

Actually there is still one such page left. See it here if you like. The pictures still hold up quite well, but there is a reason why not all four sides of the church are shown; the north side was just too shady for the Mavica to capture it well. Eventually this page will be renewed too.  

Today's subject is the page about the St. Laurentiuskerk in Breda. It had some particularly bad Mavica pictures, all made on a cloudy day, supplemented with some reasonable pictures made with my second camera, the Nikon Coolpix 995. These pictures must have saved this page. But none of these pictures are left. Since moving to Breda three years ago I've had plenty of opportunities to take new pictures. From all sides, at different times of day. My Photoshop editing on them is a bit awkward, but I still think they're an improvement. And they show the inside as well. Also the description of the church is improved a bit. Strangely, I just couldn't find much more information about this big church, a work of two major architects even.

Architects updated

The pages about architects W. te Riele and H.W. Valk have undergone some drastic editing, much like  the previous Kropholler overhaul. No new pictures, but much better biography and more complete lists of works.  

Noord-Holland update

Gone are the pages about Bussum, Naarden and Muiden. Like the municipalities, these pages are now merged and have become the new page Gooise Meren. No new pictures, but text is improved.

De nieuwe pagina Gooise Meren vervangt de pagina's over Bussum, Naarden en Muiden. 

New page

A new page was added to the Noord-Brabant section, about the churches and chapels of Etten-Leur.

Een nieuwe tweetalige pagina, over Etten-Leur.

Architect update: A.J. Kropholler

The page about architect A.J. Kropholler has had a major overhaul, and his biography is mostly rewritten and expanded drastically. Also, the pages about three of his most important churches were similarly treated; the O.L. Vrouwe van Lourdeskerk in Scheveningen, the O.L. Vrouw van Goede Raad in Beverwijk and the H.H. Martelaren van Gorcum in Amsterdam. A page with interior pictures of the latter church was also added.

Gelderland updates

A new page about the new Berg en Dal municipality was added, replacing the older pages about the (now merged) municipalities of Groesbeek and Ubbergen. Also, some new objects were added to the page about the West Maas en Waal municipality.

Nieuw in het Nederlands is de pagina over de gemeente Berg en Dal die de oudere pagina's over de opgeheven gemeentes Groesbeek en Ubbergen vervangt. De pagina over de gemeente Wijchen is nu ook tweetalig.

Noord-Brabant updates

The first update of 2016 is here, and I'm convinced it's going to be a good year for Archimon. 

The page about the Waalwijk municipality has been updated with a few new pictures and improved text. The page about the city of Tilburg has no new pictures but its text has been edited. Also, the page now has a second part for the villages in that municipality, Berkel-Enschot and Udenhout. Which means that the seperate page about Berkel-Enschot has become redundant and has been removed.

De pagina's over de gemeentes Waalwijk, Eersel en Tilburg zijn nu tweetalig, waarbij die laatste bovendien is uitgebreid met informatie over Berkel-Enschot en Udenhout.