Photo: Richard van der Klaauw [METRO]

“Het Poortgebouw” is the name of an extraordinary 19th century building, a national monument in Rotterdam’s Kop van Zuid district located on the south bank of the river Maas. Today, the name is equally connected to the collective of 30 inhabitants organised as members of an association (vereniging) established in 1982.... more

An article written in 2007, which summarises the 28 year history of the Poortgebouw Inhabitants Association and focuses on the recent crisis situation with the private owner and the development of a vision document to sustain the social and cultural functions in the Poortgebouw. read article

Intended to house the head administrative office for Rotterdamsche Handelsvereniging, the building was completed in 1879 when the founder of the RHV Lodewijk Pincoffs went bankrupt and fled the country to the United States. In the following 120 years, the building would be adapted to fit the needs of the various users and the everchanging surroundings... more

Rotterdam merchants were at first hesitant to enter the Industrial Age, but in the 1860’s they discovered they could profit off the River Maas’ connection with the Rhine. The city council decided to exploit this position by developing the south bank into harbour terrain (1863) and the dredging of the Nieuwe Waterweg (1866) connection from Rotterdam to the North Sea. From 1870 onwards the local government started an investment programme, pushed forward by Lodewijk Pincoffs, a successful merchant and wealthy member of the city council... more

On Friday night, October 3. 1980, the Poortgebouw was squatted. The building had been left abandoned —like so many others in the city— unavailable for legal alternative uses with the exception of a publicly-rejected plan for an Eroscentrum (1979). In Holland, it was (again) a time of a desperate shortage of affordable housing... more