Garden architect
Two world wars and the intervening crisis years did not stop John Bergmans growing into an expert in the field of plants and garden architecture.
John Bergmans (1892-1980) was the son of a garden master on an Antwerp estate. During World War I, he fled to the Netherlands. From approximately 1928 until his death he lived in Oisterwijk. In 1929 he married Coby Visser, daughter of architect and building contractor Jan Visser. Coby attended the Huis te Lande horticultural school for women in Rijswijk and she enthusiastically participated in her husband’s work.
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Two world wars and the intervening crisis years did not stop John Bergmans growing into an expert in the field of plants and garden architecture. He apprenticed himself to highly renowned growers and had many contacts in the Netherlands and abroad. He was familiar with the Dutch and international literature on the subject and was officially recognised as a garden architect by the Society of Dutch Garden Architects, created in 1924. A biography and some personal documents can be found in Database TUiN.
Before his death, Bergmans donated his entire collection of designs to the library of the former National Agricultural College, now Wageningen University & Research Library - Special Collections. His dendrological collection went to the Wageningen herbarium, now part of Naturalis in Leiden.
