Earthly Paradise: A trip to the Mien Ruys Gardens and Staphorst

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Let's visit this Saturday two of the hidden gems of the Overijssel region. The Mien Ruys Gardens are a monument to creativity and nature, one of the most spectacular experiments in garden design in the Netherlands. Staphorst, a small farming community, is known as a sort of informal capital of the Dutch Bible Belt. The town is famous for its beautiful farms and traditional costumes.

We will meet at 9 AM in the main hall of the Amsterdam Central Station, near the yellow information desk (on the right side of the main entrance). We will travel by train to Zwolle and then take a bus to the Mien Ruys Gardens situated in Dedemsvaart. Later, we will move on by bus to Staphorst, where we will do some sightseeing and visit the local museum. Once we finish our tour we will stop somewhere for dinner, either in Staphorst or in Zwolle. We should be back in Amsterdam around 8 PM, but if you need to return earlier there are frequent public transport connections from each location. I hope we will spend a great day together and discover the beauty of the Overijssel : )

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Wilhelmina Jacoba Moussault-Ruys, better known as Mien Ruys (1904–1999), was one of the most famous Dutch landscape and garden architects. Mien was surrounded by plants from an early age. Her father founded the Moerheim plant nursery in 1888, specializing in perennials (plants that live for more than two years). It was located in Dedemsvaart, near Zwolle. The business quickly grew and in the first half of the twentieth century it had become the most important nursery for perennials in Europe .

Beginning in 1924, Mien Ruys began experimenting with small gardens of perennials on her father's estate. She soon became interested in garden design. Because there was no training in this field in Holland at that time, Mien studied in Berlin and then got some practical experience at Tunbridge Wells in England. Her her father was a friend of Gertrude Jekyll, an influential British horticulturist, who became one of her mentors.

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During World War II she studied engineering in Delft. She also studied architecture with Marinus Jan Granpré Molière, a well-known Dutch architect and landscape planner. Soon however she returned home to work and experiment at her father's company, where she founded a small design department. Her experiments, the starting point for the current gardens, helped her become in time one of the most notable landscape and garden designers in the Netherlands. Mien Ruys collaborated a lot with architects, such as Gerrit Rietveld. Influenced by Japanese design, Ruys is credited with creating open and transparent spaces even in small gardens, by using rectangular spaces, water, bamboo, and wood,.

Her biographer Reinco Geertsema divides her work into three periods. In the early 1940's her assignments were mainly larger private gardens, in which her perennial plant borders took a prominent position. After the war, in a time of rebuilding, she designed many ‘communal gardens’ for the new residential developments of the time. Searching an optimal use of space, she designed paths, terraces and plots for plantation at an oblique angle to the buildings and in contrast with them. From the 1960’s the oblique lines were abandoned in favor of straight lines, often with very straight clipped squares of greenery, in contrast with an exuberant use of perennials. She felt that these perennials allowed an individual to have a direct experience of nature and interact with it.

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With a background in architecture, Mien Ruys understood the importance of unity between the building and the garden. She introduced eight inexpensive, ready-made planting schemes for the larger public, each suitable for a different soil type and site setting. Her socialist views greatly influenced the choice of materials for her gardens. She experimented with low cost, widely available construction materials; a signature aspect was the use of concrete pebble-dashed paving stones and railway sleepers. She also experimented with recycled materials, like plastic, as decking materials for her bog garden, Moerastuin.

Mien Ruys became known in the Netherlands by publishing a number of books. With her husband, Theo Moussault, she started a quarterly magazine in 1954, "Onze eigen tuin" (Our own garden). It is still considered one of the most creative Dutch publications in this field. Due to this activity, she is considered one of the 10 most influential contemporary garden designers in the world.

The Mien Ruys gardens are experimental gardens: right from the start, playing with plants, materials and design has been their main objective. Open for the public since 1976, the site contains nowadays 30 small model gardens. Three of these individual gardens received the status of Rijksmonument (national monument). The gardens give today a chronological overview of 20th century landscape architecture, as reflected in the work of their creator. Moreover, the knowledge accumulated through decades of experiments is made known on site through publications, guided tours, lectures, courses, and ‘theme’ days.

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Staphorst and its neighbor Rouveen were founded in the 13th century, when monks started to convert the local swamps into agricultural lands. All farms were built along the only road through the swamp area, becoming eventually the 7-miles long village of Staphorst-Rouveen. This phenomenon is called ribbon urbanization.

Often after a farmer's death his land was divided between his sons. The son who had not inherited his father's farm built a house of his own behind the older one. Many pieces of land are therefore very lengthy, yet narrow (e.g. 1500 x 40 meters). Most of the current farms were built between 1850 and 1910.

Staphorst was declared a municipality in 1811, through a decree signed by emperor Napoleon (the country was under French occupation at that time). The 1811 decree merged the villages of Rouveen, Staphorst and IJhorst along with the sparsely populated Hasselter Schoutambt into a municipality, known after 1818 as Staphorst. Since then, its borders have remained mostly unchanged through several rounds of administrative reorganizations, an exception in Dutch municipal history.

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Staphorst could be called the capital of the Dutch Bible Belt. This is the name given to a strip of land stretching from Zeeland, through the West-Betuwe and Veluwe, to the northern parts of the province Overijssel. The region is still inhabited by a large number of conservative Protestants, who maintain a strictly religious way of life.

The region's origins can be traced back to the Eighty Years' War. When Flanders and North Brabant were reconquered by the Spanish army, their Protestant inhabitants were asked to convert back to Catholicism or leave. A great part emigrated North of the border, particularly during the Twelve Years' Truce of 1609–21. Many of them later became staunch supporters of the pietist movement known as the "nadere reformatie" (further reformation). Following two schisms in the 19th century, they left the mainstream Dutch Reformed Church completely and founded their own, more conservative congregations, known colloquially as zwarte-kousenkerken (“black stockings churches”).

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The Bible Belt differs in many aspects from the surrounding regions, where church attendance is normally between 2% to 3% of the population. The church still plays a central role in the life of local communities, and they typically oppose the liberal practices of Dutch society, such as euthanasia, gay rights, abortion, etc. In Bible Belt communities, a strong religious tone in public life is accompanied by conservative personal views, preference for large families (the region has relatively high fertility rates), and an emphasis on traditional values. An aspect of local society that has been often discussed is the opposition of parents towards state-run vaccination programs. The region provides a strong support to Christian Democratic parties, but especially to the SGP and ChristenUnie.

Staphorst is still a largely orthodox Calvinist village and has one of the highest church attendance rates in the Netherlands. Seeing themselves as the true heirs of Protestant traditions, many of the local inhabitants actually attend church services twice on Sundays. On those days, shops and local public venues are closed and public transport is cancelled. The local costumes are the most visible aspect of the village's cultural differences. Much more widespread in the past, the costumes are worn nowadays only by a few hundred locals.

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This cultural orientation has further consequences in everyday life. Statistics from cable company Ziggo show that nearly 80 percent of locals have no television. This is seen as as an attempt to keep out the hedonistic values of the outside world. 20% of residents remain non-vaccinated for religious reasons. As a result, Staphorst and other similar areas in the Netherlands are classified as epidemic risk areas by the WHO – the only such areas in Europe. In the most recent municipal elections, most residents voted for the SGP Christian party, which bars women from holding public office.

The Total Fertility Rate in Staphorst is among the highest in the country. Half of young people in Staphorst move from their parental home only at marriage. Unlike in more mainstream Dutch towns, only one in 30 babies are born to unmarried parents and the town has one of the Netherlands' lowest divorce rates: 39 per 1,000 residents.

Contact with outsiders, along with industrialization, are slowly changing the town's character. Internet finds its place into more and more of the local households. The traditional opposition to vaccination as interference with God's will has also abated, with some 80 percent of Staphorst inhabitants now vaccinated against polio compared to less than 50 percent when an outbreak hit the town in 1971. However, the locals still pride themselves with their religious dedication and a strong sense of community.

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