The buildings of Naarden consist of deep houses, sometimes basement and often later increased. Old caps, beam layers or wooden skeletons often hide behind younger, mostly plastered, façades. Once or twice, two or three neighboring buildings have been joined together behind a new façade. Because of the city fire of 1572, few medieval houses remain. An exception is the transverse single-storey Gansoordstraat 14, which in the core is probably mid-15th century. At the rear is a 17th-century construction with a well. Originally presumably 16th-century is Marktstraat 32. In the back of a basement with barrel vault, the beams have a painting with scrolls (circa 1600). In the second half of the 19th century the building was raised, it was given a gable and a roof with Philibert trusses.
17th and 18th century houses
The deep house Kloosterstraat 13, built around 1600, has a stepped gable with top pilaster and checkered arches. Inside there is a cellar, a roof construction and a beam layer with maniaristic key pieces from the construction period. The building was used as a post-station in the 17th century and served for many years as the home of the Naarden (Adolf Heshuijsen) sheriff. From around 1800, the central corridor and a mantelpiece with stuccoed bosom in Louis XVI style. The substantial deep houses Kloosterstraat 9 and 11 were built at the same time in 1621 and have a continuous façade in rich Mannerist style with natural stones and checkered window arches. On the separation between the houses is an alliance weapon (1621). At No. 11, the stepped gable features claws with volutes, decorative vases and obelisks (fronton reconstructed). The top facade at No. 9 was removed around 1800. Jan Massenstraat 3 (circa 1630) has a Mannerist interior wall that is swept in and out.
Simple 17th century stepped gables, decorated only by a top pilaster and water lists, can be found at Kloosterstraat 2 and Gansoordstraat 52. The detached and very deep house Kloosterstraat 27 (circa 1640) with stepped gable, was later completely plastered and around 1900 with a shop front . Behind the plastered gables of Marktstraat 49 and Gansoordstraat 26 probably still houses 17th century houses. Probably from the second half of that century is the later plastered two-eaten transverse house Marktstraat 53. In the eighteenth century, the tall, bumpy house Marktstraat 15 got a bell-gable on the side with side-volvettes and segment-shaped pediment. The adjacent narrow transverse house Marktstraat 17 is in origin possibly older than the 17th century.
From about 1700 onwards, the plastered clock façade of Marktstraat 34 with its small natural stones dates the fads and flower decorations on the edges. A neck facade with sculpted claws has Cattenhagestraat 20-22 (circa 1740). At the transverse house Cattenhagestraat 11-11a, the middle section has been erected into a bell-gable with corner volutes and a crest in Louis XIV style. Other examples of
18th-century bell gables can be found at Gansoordstraat 40 and 44 (circa 1750) - both with corner fences - and (later plastered) at Cattenhagestraat 23 (with fronton) and Jan Massenstraat 2.
In many deep houses, the façade was later replaced by a cornice and roof shield. Examples are Cattenhagestraat 42 (ornamental anchors) and Marktstraat 36, 41-47 and 51.
For two existing buildings, the sober façade of Marktstraat 66 arose at the end of the 18th century. The house Cattenhagestraat 16 has a similar façade with an entry picture with Louis XVI details. Also the checkered entrance summaries of Turfpoortstraat 39, Kloosterstraat 6 and Turfpoortstraat 20 date from that time.
19th and 20th century houses
After a period of deprivation, the urban economy began to improve again around 1850 and refurbishments and renovations took place, such as Marktstraat 39 (circa 1860). Eclectic details show the plastered façades of Kloosterstraat 10 and Turfpoortstraat 12 (both circa 1870). The unpaved double house Turfpoorstraat 58-60 was built around 1880 in eclectic forms. A stepped gable and ornamental masonry in neo-Renaissance style has Cattenhagestraat 38 (1895). Also provided with ornamental masonry details are Ruysdaelplein 4-5 and the workers' houses St. Vitusstraat 55-65 (1906). The deep house Turfpoortstraat 56 got around 1925 a façade with expressionist masonry to plans by F. Dekker. By L. Streefkerk designed in traditionalist forms is Turfpoortstraat 55 (1932).
The Kringenwet (1853) was a serious obstacle to expansion directly around the fortress. Therefore, the oldest villas are further away, against the border with Bussum and near the station (1874). An example is the white-plastered mansion Comeniuslaan 8 (circa 1880), with middle ressault and corner pillars, and the one-layered Anne-ville (Zwarteweg 64, circa 1880) with eclectic details. The neo-Renaissance is monumental
