The Trêves Saloon in the Binnenhof in The Hague was built by William III in 1697 as a reception-room. It is embellished with a handsome ceiling and portraits of seven stadtholders. The two chimney-pieces in the hall of the first chamber represent War by Jan Lievens and Peace by Adr. Hanneman.
An example of Philip Vinckboons’s work is the Trippenhuis in Amsterdam, built in 1662 in the classic style. This is now occupied by the Royal Academy of Science.
Exceptionally noteworthy specimens of interior carving of this period are: Renaissance chimney-piece and a Gothic chimney-piece in the Louis XIV style in the Antiquarian Museum, Utrecht; a chimney-piece dating from the end of the seventeenth century, with a group of the stamp-masters of the cloth-hall, by Karel de Moor, in the Municipal Museum, Leyden; carved panelling in the council chamber, Woerden (1610); carvings in the church at Venlo; panelling in the palace of the Princess Marie on the Korte Voorhout, The Hague; a pulpit of 1685 in Broek in the Waterland; and a monument in the church of St. Ursula, Delft, to William of Orange, begun in 1616 by Hendrik de Keyser, and finished by his son Peter.
The Rijks Museum possesses many examples of panelling, chimney-pieces, and separate pieces of furniture; and several entire rooms have been correctly arranged. Among these is a room with wall-panellings and chimney-piece from Dordrecht (1626). The ceiling, supposed to be by Th. van der Schuer (about 1678), represents Morning and Evening, and is from the bedroom of Queen Mary of England, wife of William III, in the Binnenhof, The Hague. The gilt leather hangings and other furniture in this room are of the same date.
Another room contains a beautifully painted cylindrical ceiling of wood from the apartment of Mary Stuart, wife of William II, Prince of Orange, also in the Binnenhof. The panelling, chimney-piece, gilt leather hangings and furniture are also of the seventeenth century.
A notable room is that taken from the house of Constantia Huygens in The Hague, built by Jacob van Kampen. Blue silk is curiously used to embellish the panelling. The ceiling, painted by Gérard de Lairesse (1640–1711) represents Apollo and Aurora. This room is in the Louis XIV style. A later fashion is, however, shown in the splendid “Chinese Boudoir” of the latter part of the seventeenth century from the Stadtholder’s palace at Leeuwarden.
Another room deserving attention is from a small hunting-lodge called the Hoogerhuis, near Amersfoort, built about 1630 by Jacob van Kampen and inhabited by him. The room is lighted by eight small windows, over which paintings were hung. There is an interesting bedstead here, ornamented with painted garlands, and with three compartments, beneath the centred one of which is the Spanish motto, “’El todo es nada” (Everything is nought).
The Dutch of the seventeenth century passed practically all their lives at home. With the exception of merchants, students and men of affairs, people rarely visited their friends and relatives in neighbouring towns. As Pieter van Godewijck wrote:—
Het reysen is een taeck nyet yder opgelegt,
En ’t is nyet al te veel en sonder blaêm gezegt,