70 years ago, Finland provided Homes for Dutch Victims of the North Sea flood

70 years ago the 1953 North Sea Flood caused hundreds of deaths and left many inhabitants of flooded areas along the North Sea homeless. Several countries, among them Finland, donated houses for those who lost their homes in the flood in the Netherlands. They shipped prefab wooden houses, that were reassembled in the Netherlands and were meant to provide a temporary home – but many of these houses are still standing. They are known in Dutch as the “geschenkwoningen”; gifted houses.

Here is a description of the type of houses Finland donated:

> **Finland: type Fi 7e**

>The house consists of one storey with a top floor.
The gable roof is covered with red Dutch roof tiles.
The facades are clad with horizontally placed narrow
wooden parts.
Striking is the greenhouse-like extension to the main entrance
on the left side. In Finland this space was used
for putting on and taking off skis. In Finland the
house is also equipped with a basement. In the Netherlands, basements have been omitted. The masonry foundation
walls, however, were retained in order to maintain the good proportions of the house (Bouw, no. 15, 1954).

>**Finland: type Fi 5e**

>The house consists of one storey with saddle roof with
red Dutch tiles, with overhanging eaves
at the front facade. At the rear is a
veranda. The facades are clad with vertically placed
narrow wooden parts.

Examples of the houses of the first type can be found here on Google maps:

https://www.google.com/maps/@51.7141891,4.1689289,3a,75y,149.77h,80.57t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s-P1YdJijnWc8carC4LOy9w!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

The new inhabitants at first weren’t too sure what to think of these new houses. They were made of wood, and they were used to living in houses made of brick. They found the houses to be remarkably well insulated against the weather though, and some of the original inhabitants still live the remaining houses.