Gezelligmaking on the Dorpsplein

Some of our FRENS have been living on the Silja cruise ship for more than two years now, sharing small cabins, borrowing corners for privacy, and carrying on with daily life in very limited space. The Dorpsplein across the road from the boat is their only backyard, but as a bare and empty lot, it hardly invited anyone to stay. So we set out to help them make it their own, to turn it into a place where being there truly felt like belonging.

So we began with a simple question: What would it take for this place to feel like it truly belongs to the people who use it?Together with Stichting MANO, building on a similar program we ran last summer, we launched our project of Gezelligmaking on the Dorpsplein. For the kick-off, we turned the original enclosed, mostly empty space with poorly placed picnic benches into a BBQ brainstorming session, sitting around in small groups and figuring out not just what should go there, but what kind of place the residents wanted it to become.

Again and again, the same themes kept coming back: a spot where everyone feels welcome, space for coffee and tea ceremonies, shelter from the rain and wind, and corners where children could play and be loud. Underlying all of this were the basic needs of autonomy and connection.  People flourish when they are trusted to shape their surroundings, when their ideas are heard, tested and built. So instead of arriving with a plan, we worked from their input: step by step; idea by idea. The Dorpsplein grew through shared decisions, small experiments, and collective making.

It was important to us that the power stayed with the people who actually use the Dorpsplein every day. Not a design project dropped from above, but a space built together, with their stories, cultures, and everyday routines at the center.

And perhaps most strikingly, the six weeks we spent “pimping” the village square couldn’t have been further from the usual media narratives about nuisance and tensions. What we encountered was collaboration, humour, care for each other, and a genuine wish to build something shared. When you meet people as neighbours instead of headlines, the whole story changes and a different future becomes visible.