Esbjerg Water Tower is an iconic

water tower A water tower is an elevated structure supporting a water tank constructed at a height sufficient to pressurize a water distribution system, distribution system for potable water, and to provide emergency storage for fire protection. Water towe ...

Esbjerg Esbjerg (, ) is a seaport town and seat of Esbjerg Municipality on the west coast of the Jutland peninsula in southwest Denmark. By road, it is west of Kolding and southwest of Aarhus. With an urban population of 71,698 (1 January 2022)

in southwest

Jutland Jutland ( da, Jylland ; german: Jütland ; ang, Ēota land ), known anciently as the Cimbric or Cimbrian Peninsula ( la, Cimbricus Chersonesus; da, den Kimbriske Halvø, links=no or ; german: Kimbrische Halbinsel, links=no), is a peninsula of ...

, Denmark. Completed in 1897, it was designed by Christian Hjerrild Clausen who had been inspired by

Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...

's Nassauer Haus. It stands on a Bronze Age

burial mound Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

at the top of a cliff overlooking the harbour. As a result, it has become the landmark of Esbjerg.

History

Despite Esberg's rapid growth, by the mid-1890s the city's 9,000 inhabitants were still without running water. Instead, they made use of wells and supply points throughout the city. After several unsuccessful borings, a satisfactory source of water was found in the city park, Vognsbølparken. In 1895, it was decided that both gas pipes and water pipes should be installed at the same time in connection with the establishment of a gas works and a water works. The tank in the water tower had a capacity of but consumption grew so fast that in 1904 a supplementary container with a capacity of needed to be installed on Nygårdsvej. It became obvious that from the very start, the container in the water tower had been too small. From 1902, water was pumped directly to the consumers, the containers only being used to store excesses.

Architecture

Esbjerg's most accomplished architect, C.H. Clausen, usually designed his works on the basis of their function but here he was inspired by the medieval Nassauer Haus in Nuremberg which had been built in 1422 in the

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

style. The red-brick water tower has many small windows and four decorative turrets at the top where there is a viewing platform.

Opening hours

Located at No. 22 Havnegade, the water tour, which belongs to

Esbjerg Museum Esbjerg Museum in the centre of Esbjerg in southwest Jutland, Denmark, opened in 1941 with permanent collections covering the history of the city and the surrounding region. It includes displays from the Iron Age and the Viking Period as well as a ...

, is open to the public every day from June to mid-September from 10 am to 4 pm. It is also open at weekends in April and May and from mid-September until the end of October. In addition to providing excellent views over the city and its harbour, the water tower also houses a permanent exhibition of Europe's water towers.

References

{{Coord, 55, 27, 52, N, 8, 27, 00, E, type:landmark_region:DE-HB, display=title Buildings and structures in Esbjerg Listed buildings and structures in Esbjerg Municipality Museums established in 1968 Tourist attractions in the Region of Southern Denmark Water towers in Denmark Towers completed in 1897