Contact Artefacts please if you have any comments or more information regarding this record.	Menu Home Upfront Now Up Books Towns Structures People Firms Lexicon		Farmhouse Doornrivier Worcester district, Western Cape

Date: 1790 : 1831 Type: Homestead Style: Cape Dutch Status: Extant

This T-shaped house is without doubt the finest in the Worcester district. Francis Hendrik, van der Merwe, who received the first grant in 1777 built the original house in 1790. His wife's initials remain in the front gable. In 1831 Jan Daniel Opperman received the grant and added the stepped pedimented front gable with pedimented holbol side gables. The back is straight-gabled. A fire in the 1850s destroyed most of the ceilings (an original is retained in one room) but the woodwork seems to have been saved, including a fine stinkwood and yellowwood wall cupboard. The windows in the back are new. Books and articles that reference Farmhouse Doornrivier Fransen, Hans. 2004. The old buildings of the Cape. A survey of extant architecture from before c1910 in the area of Cape Town - Calvinia - Colesberg - Uitenhage. Johannesburg & Cape Town: Jonathan Ball Publishers. pg 386 Oberholster, JJ. 1972. The historical monuments of South Africa. Cape Town: Rembrandt Van Rijn Foundation for Culture at the request of the National Monuments Council. pg 88-89 Obholzer, Anton, Baraitser, Michael & Malherbe, WD. 1985. The Cape house and its interior : an inquiry into the sources of Cape architecture & a survey of built-in early Cape domestic woodwork. Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch Museum. pg 329-331