Ironing, linen and textiles in Den Haag
The Hague is a city of residences, and residences live on starched linen. As early as the seventeenth century, the stadtholders at the Binnenhof maintained their own linen room — a separate chamber where maidservants, supervised by a 'linen mistress', sorted, marked, mended and folded the court's table linen, towels, napkins and sheets. For state banquets, large quantities of double-woven damask were brought out, each piece carefully pressed with heavy flatirons heated over charcoal.
That ritual of starch, pressing and folding was not confined to the chambers of the court. Throughout the city lived a middle class of diplomats, civil servants, lawyers and merchants who paid a regular ironing maid. Until well into the twentieth century, ironers came to the home a few hours a week to prepare shirts, collars and cuffs for the working week. The Hague shirt collar — white, crisply starched, perfectly straight — was for years a kind of urban uniform.
That taste for impeccable whites has never really left. The embassy quarters, the ministerial-conservative streets around the Catshuis, the notaries' offices on the Lange Voorhout: each of them places where a crease-free shirt is still simply expected. In Escamp, Loosduinen and the newer residential districts too, every household runs on a substantial laundry basket each week — there is just less time these days to sit down to it.
Since 2013 we have been driving out from our laundry on the Henricuskade through The Hague. In the morning your laundry bag is ready; in the evening it is back at the front door — washed, ironed, folded, in the wardrobe order you want it arranged. The same delivery driver, the same day of the week, with no fuss about appointments. The Hague's linen story has simply carried on — only now with our machines instead of your evenings.
How does Strijkservice Haaglanden work in Den Haag?
For residents of Den Haag our service works exactly as in the rest of Haaglanden: on a fixed day of the week our driver comes by, picks up your laundry bag and brings your laundry back clean and crisply ironed. No appointment needed — your routine is set.
You get one regular driver and a fixed pickup rhythm so you always know what to expect. No carrying, no full drying racks in the living room, no evenings at the ironing board.
Everything is handled in our own laundry on Henricuskade in The Hague. Shirts, blouses, table linen, bed and bath textiles — we iron it the way it should go back into the cupboard at home, neatly folded and ready to use.