Iwema Steenhuis
The Iwema Steenhuis in Niebert was built around 1400. A ‘steenhuis’ (stone house) was often built as a safe refuge, with walls that were frequently more than a metre thick.
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The entrance was often on the first floor and could be reached by a staircase that could be removed quite easily. Many stone houses later developed into borgs. The Iwema Steenhuis did not. Probably because the family did not belong to the Groningen nobility. The Iwema Steenhuis is the only stone house in the province of Groningen that can be recognised as a stone house from the outside. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the stone house was converted into a farm. Owned by the Groninger Landschap, the Iwema Steenhuis huis is not open to the public as it is still inhabited. Behind the house, a barn houses a museum. Also in the garden is the largest red beech tree in the province of Groningen.