Opening: the Kreiken study square

On 29 April, the moment finally arrived. Almost five months after the symposium celebrating his 100th birthday, the Kreiken Study Square officially opened its doors.

A lasting, physical tribute to a man who believed that the future cannot be predicted, but must be created.

Boet and Ymke Kreiken together with Kreiken committee members of S.A. Stress at the official opening of the Kreiken Study Square, 29 April.

As his daughter said at the symposium: generations stand on each other's shoulders. On 29 April, that idea was given an address.

Boet and Ymke Kreiken were present to witness the moment themselves. For them, it was more than a symbolic gesture: it was the fulfilment of an idea born in the spring of 2024, which has now — thanks to the dedication of the Kreiken committee (Nienke Hamster, Lex de Jager, Camiel de Jager, Cleo Ballon and Ingmar Trip) and the support of the Alumni & Development Office (Magali Coello and Maurice Essers, director of the University Fund) — found a permanent place on campus.

The photos from that day tell their own story. Boet Kreiken, bent over a memory wall full of old photographs, looking at the face of his father.

A warm handshake with the Stress board members who helped make the whole project possible.

And on the back of their polo shirts: "Niet zeiken maar kreiken" — "Stop complaining and get Kreiken" — the phrase once scrawled on an improvised sign by a small tree, now immortalised as the emblem of a study association that lives up to its name.

The study square itself, with its banner telling his life story beside tables full of students simply — exactly as intended — getting on with their work, may well be the finest tribute of all. Not a statue, not a silent plaque, but a living space. A place where the next generation, perhaps without even realising it, builds daily on the legacy of Jan Kreiken.

The Kreiken Study Square in use: students at work, exactly as Jan Kreiken envisioned — a place for people, not for standing still.