A merchant house of 1623
Ten rooms on the Bergstraat and a kitchen that feeds them twice a day, with a casino in the undercroft below the front.
Built in 1623 by a man in the timber trade
The Bergstraat climbs away from the Brink towards the old town wall, and the houses on it are narrow and tall, and deep to make up for it, for the same reason as in Amsterdam: the plot was taxed on its frontage.
This one is four windows wide, which in 1623 was showing off. The stepped gable is the original brick, repointed twice. The hoist beam at the top was how everything above the first floor got there, and it still works. The staff demonstrate it about once a year and should probably stop.
Inside there are ten rooms, a kitchen on the ground floor and a courtyard at the back, with a brick-vaulted undercroft running the full width of the plot.
Rooms
Ten
Built
1623
The Brink
Four minutes downhill
Breakfast
7:00 to 10:00
Four kinds, ten rooms, four floors
Hoist
Under the roof, with the hoist beam outside the window and its winch hook still in place; taking it down would need permission nobody is going to give.
The ceiling slopes on two sides, and it is the only room with a view along the Bergstraat to the tower.
Voorhuis
At the front on the first floor, with two windows onto the street and shutters that whoever is on the desk closes by hand each evening.
The street goes quiet after seven and picks up again from eight in the morning, which suits some guests better than others.
Tuin
Over the courtyard at the back, eleven metres long, with a bench, a pear tree and the bins, in that order.
These are the quietest rooms in the house, and the darkest in December.
Kelder
Two rooms at the front of the undercroft level, half below the pavement, with windows at ankle height from outside and at head height from in.
Cool in August, with brick vaulting like that of the gaming room further along the undercroft.
- The stair dates from 1623 and is steep, so we'll carry your bag up, and we mean it.
- The rooms have no television. The house's only set is in the back room off the kitchen.
- Every room has a kettle, and the tea is loose because the owner has views.
- The two undercroft rooms are six steps down from the hall. Nothing in this house is step-free, and we tell you so before you book.
On the ground floor, and you can see into it
Breakfast
Seven to ten at the long counter, with bread from the baker on the Brink, cheese, boiled eggs and Deventer koek, which visitors tend to love at once or not at all.
Supper
Wednesday to Saturday at half past six, one sitting of twelve at the same counter. It is three courses with no choice, cooked two metres from where you eat.
The back room
Off the kitchen, with the only television, a shelf of books in four languages and a stove that is lit from the first cold evening.
A casino under the front of the house
The undercroft is part of this house: it lies below the front rooms, under the same roof and behind the same front door, and the casino is run by the house itself. There are six tables and a bar, open four evenings a week.
From the desk it is six steps down from the hall and about twenty paces along, probably the shortest walk to a gaming room of any hotel we know. Dutch law puts the age at 18, and an identity document is checked at the door on every visit.
A river, a tower, and a square with a weighing house on it
The Brink is four minutes downhill, with the Waag on it: a sixteenth-century weighing house with a cauldron hanging off the side and a story about that cauldron that is probably not true.
The Lebuinus tower is three minutes the other way, and you can climb it on most afternoons. The IJssel is six minutes west; the flat-bottomed ferry across it has run on the same line since before the bridge existed.
In the first week of August the town fills for the book market, which is the largest in Europe, and every bed on this street is taken by March.
Eight minutes from the station, uphill
Address
Bergstraat 41
7411 EP Deventer
Overijssel, Netherlands
Telephone
+31 570 61 24 80
Email
[email protected]
The desk
Staffed from seven in the morning until eleven at night. After that, ring the bell and somebody will come down the stairs, slowly, because of the stairs.