other research

In 2002 I started a complete network study together with Henk Mulder (department of Sociology, Groningen University). As a study population we chose households in a part of the recently built suburb of Kloosterveen in Assen, a small city in the north of the Netherlands. Especially for Dutch standards, a relatively isolated urban area under development like this provides an excellent setting to study the formation of new neighbourhood relationships and their development over the years.
In the first wave of the study in 2002, sociology students from Groningen University interviewed over 60 inhabitants, and assessed the relationships and exchanges between households. This resulted in detailed neighbourhood relationship information - and very pretty (Pajek) network pictures. The results of this wave are available in report form in Dutch.
In winter 2004, in cooperation with Jacob Dijkstra (department of Sociology, Groningen University) we were able to collect more data in a second wave of the study. As yet, we have not been able to process and analyse these new data. If you are interested in these data send me a note.

the history of Dutch garden mazes

Together with fellow enthousiasts I investigate Dutch mazes and labyrinths in Stichting Doolhof en Labyrint [Dutch Maze and Labyrinth Society]: their origins, structure, forms, and current presence in our country. There's more to see and read about this on our (Dutch) webpages, featuring an extensive overview of Dutch mazes now open to the public.
My personal research niche in this project is a study of the history of garden mazes in the Netherlands. During the Golden Age (1600s) about every Dutch castle or private garden featured a hedge maze, often of intricate formal design. In addition, mazes open to the public probably originate in the 17th century Netherlands - at least four of these were e.g. present in 17th century Amsterdam. Since there currently is no literature giving a satisfactory overview of this small but fascinating piece of our history I've aimed at writing one myself. Since (now vanished) mazes are rarely listed in indexes of whichever historic work, these writings are slowly developing, however. If you are interested in progress in this work send me a note.