WUR Library

The Springer library (1630-1940)

In 1940, the well known Dutch garden designer L.A. Springer left a large collection containing his library, his herbarium, designs, old prints, photographs and other documentary materials on gardens and garden architecture to Wageningen University.

700 Books

Leonard Antonij Springer was landscape and garden architect and dendrologist. (Amsterdam 24-1-1855 - Haarlem 28-9-1940) who donated his comprehensive collection to the 'Landbouwhogeschool' in Wageningen.
The Springer collection contains over 700 books. The oldest book in the collection is a work on horticulture by P. Lauremberg, dating from 1632. Besides books on landscape architecture and garden history of the Netherlands and abroad there are books on ornamental planting and architecture. This collection contains a lot of relatively modern books (20th century) but as a whole it is unique in its topic, even for Europe.
The herbarium of Springer became part of the Herbarium Vadense, which was known as the Herbarium, the Wageningen branch of the Nationaal Herbarium Nederland. The Wageningen Herbarium moved in 2013 to the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden.

Database TUiN

The designs and documentation collected by Springer was the start of TUiN (Garden Architecture Archives of the Netherlands). In this database you can find Springer's designs and the documentation he gathered about Dutch gardens and garden history.