Presikhaaf, Arnhem — Area Guide & Where to Stay

What are the main landmarks in Presikhaaf?

The shopping centre was among the first in the country. Winkelcentrum Presikhaaf opened in 1965, which made Arnhem one of the earliest municipalities to have one at all. Paris held it up as a model.

The Batimat exhibition of 1971 showed Presikhaaf as the most modern shopping centre in Europe. Two rebuilds have followed since. The 1990s brought a covered passage in a thorough reconstruction, and a third renovation ran between 2016 and 2019, by which time the centre counted about eighty-five shops.

What is the history of Presikhaaf?

A fourteenth-century estate gave the quarter its name. It is traced either to Sander van Presichaven or to a family Van Presichave who held the land, and the name outlasted the estate itself. Arnhem wanted the ground in the 1930s.

The municipality had its eye on the estate because it lay on the route from the centre to Velp, and workers' housing was needed urgently. The war postponed everything. Building began only afterwards, and the first low-rise houses went up in 1949, on a scale set by how much had been lost in Arnhem during the fighting.

Three numbered quarters followed. Blauwe Weide and het Podium came first from 1948, the Deltakwartier and the Nieuwe Vaart in the recovery years after, and Presikhaaf 3 in the 1960s.

Where is Presikhaaf?

Presikhaaf lies in the north-east of Arnhem in Gelderland, separated from Velp by the A12 motorway and bounded on the south by the railway from Arnhem to Zutphen.