Theme, Mills, Kinderdijk, The Netherlands by Maarten Kost

About "Theme, Mills, Kinderdijk, The Netherlands"

by Maarten Kost

About the artwork

The windmills of Kinderdijk concern nineteen windmills in the northwest of the Alblasserwaard, a region in the province of South Holland. Although they are designated as belonging to the village of Kinderdijk (municipality of Molenlanden), one mill is located just outside of it (De Blokker), in the municipality of Alblasserdam.

These are bosom mills, which form two mill corridors and are a major (also international) tourist attraction. They have been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1997 and the area is also a protected townscape. The mill rows can only be viewed on foot or by bicycle. Two mills are open to the public.

The mills at Kinderdijk were built from the end of the fifteenth century, but the current mills date almost all from 1738 and 1740.

The windmills of Kinderdijk are built to pump up the water from the low-lying polder. Almost all of them are ground sailors. At the bottom of each mill is a scoop wheel that raises the water, often with a height difference of 140 centimeters. There is also one seesaw between the windmills of Kinderdijk, De Blokker.

In the Alblasserwaard, the mills move the water in two steps. First, the water from a polder is pumped into a water basin. Two large reservoir waters come together at Kinderdijk. These are the Groote- or Achterwatererschap for the Boezem of the Overwaard and the Nieuwe Waterschap for the Boezem of the Nederwaard. They ended up at Elshout, northwest of the Alblasserwaard and waters down to the river Lek