Where to Stay in Purmerend, Provincie Noord-Holland

What is Purmerend known for?

Purmerend sits inside a ring of polders, with the Purmer, the Beemster and the Wormer drained around it, and the town itself holding the market square the whole district came to. The Koemarkt is that square. Its name keeps the cattle trade in view, and the listed houses along the Bierkade, the Weerwal and Venediën are what the old centre still shows.

Purmerends Museum holds the local record, while Amsterdam draws the working day out of the town and back again.

What are the main landmarks in Purmerend?

The register runs to house fronts. Bierkade, Koemarkt, Weerwal, Venediën, Wagenbeurs and Purmersteenweg all carry protected addresses, and one of them is listed simply as Huis met lijstgevel, which is about as plain as a monument name gets. Churches and a museum finish it.

Saint Nicholas and the Lutherse Kerk stand in Purmerend, the Hervormde kerk at Kwadijk out on the polder, and Villa Clementine and the Purmerends Museum hold the rest between them.

What is the history of Purmerend?

The polders came first. Purmer, Beemster and Wormer were drained around the town, and Purmerend found itself at the middle of new farm country made out of water. Markets followed the land.

Koemarkt still carries the cattle trade in its name, and the Wagenbeurs beside it names a dealing of the same kind. Money showed in the fronts. Bierkade, Weerwal, Venediën and Purmersteenweg all keep listed houses, one of them recorded only as Huis met lijstgevel, and together they are what the old market town left standing.

Faith kept its own buildings. Saint Nicholas and the Lutherse Kerk served the town while the Hervormde kerk at Kwadijk served the polder outside it. Growth came late and fast.

Purmerend stayed a modest market town for a long stretch, then filled out as a commuter town of the Randstad, with work and school in Amsterdam pulling people across the polder every morning. Villa Clementine belongs to the older layer. Purmerends Museum keeps the account of both, and Zaanstreek-Waterland still counts the town among its largest.

Where is Purmerend?

Polders on every side. The Purmer, the Beemster and the Wormer surround Purmerend, so the town sits at the centre of a district largely made by drainage rather than by any older shore. Kwadijk and Wijdewormer lie out there.

Both stand on the polder ground, the first with its Hervormde kerk and the second with a Ringdijk address that names the dike running round the drained land.

What is the climate of Purmerend?

Open ground, temperate air. Nothing rises between Purmerend and the weather crossing the Beemster, which keeps the seasons here much as they are anywhere else in North Holland. The market square is exposed.

Koemarkt takes the wind straight off the polder, while the Purmerends Museum, Saint Nicholas and the Lutherse Kerk are where a raw afternoon in this town is usually spent.

How do you get to Purmerend?

The commute defines the route. Purmerend is a commuter town of the Randstad, and the traffic between it and Amsterdam is the movement most arrivals join whether they mean to or not. Roads cross the drained land.

Any approach runs over the Purmer, the Beemster or the Wormer, past Kwadijk or Wijdewormer, and ends on the Koemarkt where the old town still centres itself.