Cuypers Gothic School, Limburg, Dutch Architecture Print, Leliman, 1865-1866

Antique Dutch architectural print of a Gothic Revival school in the province of Limburg by P. J. H. Cuypers, an uncoloured lithograph from J. H. Leliman's album of 1865 to 1866, by the architect later renowned for the Rijksmuseum and Amsterdam Centraal Station.

The sheet is titled in an ornamental gothic-script banner as a design for a school building in Limburg, the place name set in the same decorative lettering. The main image, headed 'Hoofdfaçade', shows the school front in brick and stone: a steep gabled roof breaking forward into twin dormer-like gables at either end and a taller central gable carrying a canopied niche with a small figure, a rose or quatrefoil window beneath, a pointed-arch doorway with a pair of studded doors, and an octagonal stair turret with a small spire beside the entrance.

Below, a titling banner separates the plan from the site plan. The school plan shows two large, separate classrooms for boys and girls, each entered through its own porch, a teacher's room between them and lavatories at both ends; the 'Situatie-Plan' sets the school on an awkward triangular plot with a curved drive and a small quatrefoil garden bed before the entrance. A cross-section, 'Doorsnede A.B.', cuts through a classroom to show the open timber roof, a king-post and raking-strut truss carried on stone corbels above round-arched windows.

The lithography is fine, uncoloured line with soft grey and sepia washes. Jan Hendrik Leliman (1828 to 1910), an Amsterdam architect and a founder of the architects' society Architectura et Amicitia, edited the album, gathering in it his own designs and those of fellow Dutch architects. His credit runs lower left and the imprint of the lithographer S. Lankhout of The Hague lower right. As an early school design by Cuypers, from the years before his great Amsterdam commissions, this antique architectural lithograph is of more than routine interest, and it would suit a school, a study or a collector of Cuypers and of Limburg.

The sheet is in fair to good condition for its age. There is toning, stronger along the right edge, a tide line in the upper right corner, light creasing along the left edge and a few small spots. Please see the images for further detail.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.