Photo Sven Menschel House: De Rechtbank
Residents: Rebecca Hagos (23), Leonne Mulder (21), Jet van de Merwe (21), Tommy Veltman (20), Daan Kisteman (22), Hein Koopmans (22), Koen van Raaij (19), Masha Hulleman (19), Anne Elke van der Molen (21) and HJ Krabbenborg (18).
Unique because: The house is made up of a former law firm’s office, garage and antique dealer’s that were merged into a single student house in 2015.
Daan: ‘This house consists of what used to be a lawyers’ office, a garage and a workshop. They were merged in 2015 and various new walls were built. Right now we’re sitting in the kitchen-diner, which used to be the inner courtyard of the lawyers’ office. The old garage is now called the Fun Room. When De Rechtbank (‘court house’) had just become a student house, there were still old motorbikes in the garage. New housemates had to sleep between them. At the moment, there’s a first-year staying there who hasn’t got a room yet.’
Leonne: ‘The part of the house at the back is called the Sluts House. The name came from the fact that the first two people to live in that part of the house were going through a wild phase.’
Jet: ‘You can see the lawcourt theme all around the house. There are murals of Lady Justice and we’ve got a pair of weighing scales hanging up.’
Daan: ‘We’ve got a wall on which we write each other’s ‘Sjaars’ moments. ‘Sjaars’ is short for first-years in Dutch. All our housemates’ naïve moments when they did something silly or ignorant are written there.’ Masha: ‘There’s a house hammer too. Rather than announcing a verdict with it, people who are moving out of the house can use it to leave their mark behind, with paint. All ex-‘Rechters’ do that. But right now the hammer has been nicked by another student house. We can get it back if we organize a drinks party for them.’
If you too want your UNIque house in Resource, send an email to resource@wur.nl.
