Historical Atlas of Eindhoven - From a small market town to the centre of the Brainport region

Diverse auteurs

Produced in collaboration with Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e)

Eindhoven arose in the thirteenth century on the River Dommel at the point where trade routes from Antwerp, Liège and ’s-Hertogenbosch met. It was granted town privileges in 1232 but did not grow any further, remaining a small town with large plots of agricultural and horticultural ground within its walls.

Eindhoven only became an attractive location for industrial ventures during the course of the nineteenth century. Land and labour were cheap and the accessibility was improved when connections by rail and water were created. The pace of urban development picked up sharply with the arrival of the Philips light bulb factory in 1891. The city and its surroundings turned into a patchwork of industrial complexes plus village centres and working-class neighbourhoods that grew together and it continued to grow after the Second World War. The Technische Hogeschool – now Eindhoven University of Technology – was opened in 1957 in Philips’ wake.

Many industrial companies, including Philips, moved away during the 1990s. High tech became the key economic sector. New residential and working districts appeared on the deserted factory sites such as Strijp s. The High Tech Campus arose on the former NatLab site.

The Historical Atlas of Eindhoven tells the fascinating spatial history of the city and its surroundings in thirty-five chapters by means of old and new maps, drawings, prints, paintings and photographs.

A special section is devoted to the development of the university campus.

In the media

Please see a review in an online English paper for the expat community in the Brainport region: 

eindhovennews.com/features/2021/03/exploring-eindhoven-region-historical-atlas-of-eindhoven/