Final Places: Geographies of death and remembrance in the Netherlands

Natural burial grounds represent a new burial provision in the Netherlands. We use Bergerbos natural burial ground to examine how the concept of natural burial grounds is interpreted, as well as the people who have chosen burial at Bergerbos. We found that an important aim of Bergerbos it to provide the users freedom to arrange burials the way they wish. Its mature woodland and aim of habitat preservation distinguish it from the most common interpretation of British natural burial grounds which create new habitat through the marking of graves with commemorative trees. These different interpretations of woodland burial carry implications for the preservation of the deceased’s individual identity. In the
Netherlands such individuality is signified by permanent grave markers, while in the UK, the individual grave identities become subsumed into a shared collective memorial landscape over time. However, Bergerbos implemented strict regulations about materialized memorialization, which may affect the way bereaved can express the deceased’s individuality and the freedom they experience at Bergerbos. Burial records of Bergerbos show that age matters. Bergerbos enjoys popularity among baby boomers and parents of
deceased babies. The notion of returning to nature provides people, especially those who are terminally ill, a sense of reconciliation.