Home to one of the oldest cheese markets in the Netherlands, Roode Steen is a historic public square and road junction in the centre of the city of Hoorn in North Holland.

Roode Steen is also fittingly known by the name Kaasmarkt, meaning cheese market in Dutch. Hoorn’s summer cheese market takes place here every year from June to August/September.

If you look around Roode Steen, you’ll notice the Westfries Museum on the west, the 17th-century weigh house (the Waag) on the east, and a statue of Jan Pieterzoon Coen, the founder of the Dutch East India Company, in the middle of the square.

Some are surprised to find out Roode Steen has a bloody past. The name Roode Steen means red stone or fortress, calling back to the square’s archaic use as an execution site.