22. Garage / documentation centre

This garage had space for two cars: Mr Sonneveld’s Plymouth deluxe, which he later traded in for a Chevrolet, and his wife's two-seater Packard convertible. The cars were another example of Mr Sonneveld’s penchant for all things American. He was driven by a chauffeur, who lived elsewhere and arrived most mornings to take him to the factory, while Mrs Sonneveld drove herself. The garage is now the home of the documentation centre, where you can find out more about the Nieuwe Bouwen or Dutch Functionalism movement, the Sonnevelds, and the subsequent owners. When the family left in 1955 the Belgian consul moved in, but neither they nor he made any major changes to the house. The current owner, the Rotterdam Historic Popular Monuments Foundation, bought the house in 1997 and found it to be in reasonably good condition. The foundation joined forces with the Netherlands Architectural Institute to turn the house into a museum, and it was therefore restored to its original condition. Since 2013, Het Nieuwe Instituut has been responsible for the opening of the house.

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Sonneveld House is one of the best-preserved houses in the Dutch Functionalist style. The villa was designed in 1933 by architecture firm Brinkman and Van der Vlugt for Albertus Sonneveld, a director of the Van Nelle Factory.