Netherlands · Provincie Zuid-Holland · Gouda
Bloemendaal, Gouda — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Bloemendaal is older as a name than as an address. The polder east of the Gouwe was being reclaimed by about 1100, and the settlement is on record as Blommendale in 1298. The wijk that now carries the name is 1970s Gouda: terraces and gallery flats in the city's north-west corner, between the A12 and the railway. It is a working quarter. The Groene Hart Ziekenhuis, the Groenhovenbad and the Goudse Poort business park all sit inside its edges.
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Where to stay in Bloemendaal
The right area depends on your trip — here's what each neighbourhood is best for.
Gouda keeps its beds in the old centre and gives Bloemendaal its working parts. What the district offers a traveller is position, not a bed. Gouda station stands at its southern edge and the Boerhaavekwartier begins a few hundred metres north of the platforms, so a room in the Binnenstad puts the district within a short walk; the Markt lies about 2 km south-east of it.
Drivers have the A12 along the northern edge, with the A20 branching off just west at knooppunt Gouwe. The Goudse Poort end is offices, showrooms and warehouse retail. Sleep in Gouda proper.
Come out here for the Groenhovenbad, an appointment at the Groene Hart Ziekenhuis, or a Saturday match at Groenhovenpark.
Few places to stay in Bloemendaal — most visitors book in Gouda nearby.
About Bloemendaal
What are the main landmarks in Bloemendaal?
The set piece is a swimming pool. The Groenhovenbad opened on Tobbepad on 20 April 2013 with three indoor baths, an outdoor pool and two toddler pools; its 34 by 25 metre competition bath is named De Tobbe, after the 1980 open-air pool that stood next door until 2014. Groenhovenpark, just west of it, carries the pitches of SV Gouda, an amateur football club founded in 1906 as Excelsior, and the semi-water hockey fields of GMHC.
The Groene Hart Ziekenhuis holds the eastern end at Bleulandweg 10. Along the Bloemendaalseweg a handful of old farmsteads outlived the building of the wijk and now work as the Goudse Hofsteden. For the postcard city, the Markt and the stained glass of the Sint-Janskerk, you leave the district for the Binnenstad about 2 km south-east.
What is the history of Bloemendaal?
Gouda's first church stood here. Gouda's earliest parish church stood in Bloemendaal and served the whole area until 1278, and the name is on record as Blommendale in 1298; its farms lined the Cleyweg, a road laid on the clay bank of the Gouwe. Bloemendaal became a municipality in its own right in 1798, was absorbed by Gouda in 1811, broke loose again in 1816, and ended up inside Waddinxveen in 1870.
Gouda annexed it back in 1964. Building started in the 1970s on the strip south of the A12 and opened a shortfall of 100 million in the municipal budget, remembered ever since as Het Gat van Bloemendaal. The planner Wim van Es (1935-2016) drew both this wijk and Plaswijck.
Where is Bloemendaal?
Four hard edges box the wijk in: the A12 to the north, the Bloemendaalseweg to the north-east, the rail lines into Gouda station to the south, and the Gouwe to the west. Six buurten fill them. De Goudse Poort takes the western third as a business park rather than a neighbourhood; the Boerhaavekwartier holds the hospital; and the Groenhovenkwartier, the Gaardenbuurt and the paired Windrooskwartier en Heesterbuurt hold the housing, their streets named for herbs, shrubs and Dutch navigators - Wijnruitgaarde, Vuurdoornlaan, Willem Barentszlaan.
The Burgemeester van Reenensingel runs the length of it as a distributor road built to be crossed on foot. The 35-tonne sculpture Twee cirkels, by Ad Dekkers, was set on the A12 embankment north-west of here in 1998, on Waddinxveen's ground rather than Gouda's.
Common questions
What is the best area to stay in Bloemendaal?
Binnenstad: sights, restaurants and the widest choice of rooms. Bloemendaal: a car, the A12 and an early start at the hospital or the pool.
Updated September 2026