Koornbeurs is an open fraternity, which means they welcome all young people as members, not just students.
Originally the Delft branch of the national Christian association Societas Studiosorum Reformatorum, founded in 1907, the fraternity lost its religious identity during the 1980’s and became formally known as OJV de Koornbeurs in 1991.
The OJV stands for open youth club, and all young people in the Delft region between the ages of 16 and 30 are welcome at Voldersgracht 1.
At first glance you might consider the average member a little alternative. “People with long hair that listen to metal music, drum and bass DJ’s, people in rock bands, there’s a place for everyone,” said Suzanne Onderdelinden, external affairs and building officer. You can join at any time, but most freshman activities are during the first few months of the academic year. With this year’s new recruits their membership will total 280, with 30-40% being women, 70-80% coming from TU Delft, and an occasional international member.
Until recently Koornbeurs served as a bar, restaurant, music venue and nightclub. You could get a cheap meal in the main hall four evenings a week, and that’s also where the big parties were held, but noise nuisance measurements carried out by the municipality mean those days are over. “Basically the building leaks, and we can’t produce more than 83 decibels in the main hall now, which means no more parties there unless we carry out around 700,000 euros worth of work!” explained Onderdelinden. The main hall is to be rented out, but the fraternity will still have the cellar bar with its cosy atmosphere, and the tea attic with 42 types of tea on offer.
There’s no formal structure or hierarchy, although some members have organised themselves into groups called disputen and given themselves a name and identity. Like most fraternities they have some traditions, such as collecting as many pencils as possible from IKEA during initiation, or the birthday cocktail with a shot from each bottle behind the bar. Monday is board game evening, and Wednesdays are the main members evening with special activities taking place. They have a beer contract with Jupiler, although they are special beer fans too.
The historic Koornbeurs building dates back to the 13th century. “After World War II the fraternity was granted the building as a token of gratitude for their help with the resistance,” said Onderdelinden. It was previously used for storing meat and grain, as a mushroom nursery and as a bike shed.
See their website for more information.
In this series we’ll be meeting TU Delft’s student fraternities. These fraternities are called gezelligheidsverenigingen in Dutch, which translates as ‘social clubs’, but in fact they’re far more than that. If you’d like to suggest a fraternity for us to cover, please email us at deltainternational@tudelft.nl.
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