Impressions from a weekend in The Hague

The Hague… a city in Holland, not as famous as Amsterdam, and home to the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court. Embarrassingly, those were my associations with The Hague until now.

Last weekend we stayed there to visit my husband’s niece and her young family, and I continue to be struck by how beautiful, interesting and welcoming it was - and how much I would love to go back again to explore it further..

We visited the Mauritshuis, walked on the beach at Scheveningen and finally explored Escher in the Palace - that is of course only a tiny fraction of what the city has to offer, but it was as much as we could do in a weekend with a 9-year-old in tow.

You can travel around The Hague very comfortably by tram using a credit/debit card - but remember to tap out when you leave the tram as well as tapping in when you board, to avoid being charged a higher fare.

Mauritshuis - a gem of a museum filled with Dutch masterpieces

This museum should be at the top of your list if you are planning a visit to The Hague, or even Amsterdam (the two cities are only a 45 minutes apart by train!)

Rembrandt's self portrait (1669)

Vermeer's ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ and Fabritius' ‘The Goldfinch’ gained mainstream popularity over the last few decades through the eponymous novels based on these two paintings. Both paintings can be admired at the Mauritshuis, and have become the highlights of the museum, although it is home to many other masterpieces from the Dutch and Flemish Golden Age, like Rubens and Frans Hals paintings and numerous still lifes of flowers known as bloemstilleven. You can also see Rembrandt’s 1669 self portrait there.

The Mauritshuis has a very useful website that lets you zoom deep into the paintings and read up about them, which I would recommend doing before you go there to enable you to seek out a few pieces that you can then spend more time observing. As expected 'Girl with a Pearl Earring' had a crowd of people in front of it taking photos, so we moved along quickly.

Dirck de Bray, Still life with a bouquet in the making, 1674. Mauritshuis, The Hague

We stayed at the museum for only an hour, which I spent mostly observing the amazingly realistic floral still life paintings by de Heem, van Hulsdonck and de Bray. The intricate detail of leaves, petals and water droplets gives these paintings an extraordinary depth, and the closer you look the more small creatures like ants, beetles, flies and snails will surprise you, dotted all over the paintings. Butterflies in various stages of metamorphosis symbolise the transience of life. Each creature depicted actually carries a specific meaning, as explained in this brilliant blog post by Heather Bolen.

I desperately want to go back to the Mauritshuis again to look at everything more closely, and preferably with an audio guide!

The mind boggling designs of M.C. Escher - Escher in Het Paleis

When I was about 9, my father handed me a book of M.C. Escher designs called “Kaleidocycles”. I was absolutely baffled by the designs - how could someone draw a lizard that fits perfectly into the outlines of another lizard and still look like a lizard?

The paper on the pages of the book was perforated around the designs so that you could tear them out and fold them into geometric shapes and what would today be called ‘fidget toys’. I built all these 3D objects, learning about geometry, and then my father helped me to attach strings and we hung them from the ceiling of my bedroom.

Thus, Escher’s designs left such a lasting impression on me that when the opportunity arose to travel to The Hague, I had to make sure we planned a visit to the permanent exhibition Escher in the Palace with my daughter - she is 9. She already knew many of the designs, but to see them in real life was exciting for us both.

Tessellating lizards by M.C. Escher at Escher in Het Paleis, The Hague.

Tessellations, or ‘tile’ patterns made up of repeated shapes that fit into each other without any gaps or overlaps, have been used in creative practices like pattern design for fabrics and tiles, mosaics and quilt making for hundreds of years. Escher himself was inspired by his visit to the Alhambra palace in Granada which is adorned with Moorish patterns of interlocking stars and geometric shapes. But the way in which he incorporated concrete shapes such as representations of animals into his tessellations is unique to him and makes his designs distinctive and instantly recognisable.

To me, one of the most fascinating pieces of the exhibition at the Palace is 'Metamorphosis III', a series of woodcuts depicting creatures and geometric shapes that do not only tessellate, they morph into other shapes: triangles turn into birds turn into squares turn into buildings turn into chess pieces. There are also several prints of his 'impossible constructions’ and ‘drawing hands’, which are fascinating for children and adults to look at.

The museum offers a free scavenger hunt for children so that they can walk through the exhibition with a mission to fulfil.

Scheveningen - the small former fishing village with a long beach perfect for walks

When we arrived at Scheveningen, it was a cold but sunny day. We walked along the residential streets and the terraced houses with their brick facades and tall, narrow sash windows reminded me of Victorian houses in London. All around The Hague you will see the most beautiful Art Deco stained glass windows, resulting from the city’s rapid growth during the early 20th century and between the first and second world wars.

The whole area has a friendly village feel to it, with small benches next to front doors, suggesting that neighbours sit outside when it’s sunny to chat to each other. As you would expect in Holland, bicycles are everywhere, and cargo bikes which have a large bucket seat on the front for carrying shopping, little people or dogs, have become something of a status symbol.

'Klinkers' - paving stones in The Hague.

The city is very walkable and all the pedestrian areas and many roads are paved with so-called ‘klinkers’, long bricks that are laid in a beautiful herringbone pattern. This has been done historically all over the Netherlands for its durability and permeability, allowing water to drain away easily. I loved the aesthetics of it.

Sea shells at Scheveningen beach.

The long sandy beach at Scheveningen is within easy reach, and is a paradise for people who love sea shells. I do not know if there is always such an abundance of shells or if they had been washed up by winter storms, but in places it appeared there were more shells than sand.

The Hague is the perfect city to visit with children for a mini break!

In all, and completely unexpectedly to me, The Hague made for a perfect city break with a child. The streets are quiet, the museums are not overcrowded, and none of it felt exhausting or overwhelming.

From London you can easily travel to The Hague by Eurostar (London - Rotterdam), so it was the perfect weekend getaway!