Every street in this Dutch neighbourhood is named after Lord of the Rings

The small, unassuming town of Geldrop in Eindhoven has every street named after J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. It’s the moment all fans of the epic trilogy have been waiting for!

Why make this a Lord of the Rings village? Simple: consistency. The streets needed some sort of theme, and the best idea they could come up with was Lord of the Rings! And we’re here for it!

In the heart of the city is Laan von Tolkien (Tolkien Avenue). From this centre, the streets branch out into names of hobbits, elves, dwarves and even a few ents (the talking trees). 🌳

A Lord of the Rings town

The street-naming system is pretty well executed: all the streets are organised in clusters of characters that are related to each other. For example, in the north of the neighbourhood are the Gondorian streets with names like Aragon, Denethor, and Palantir.

To the west is the dwarf section, which includes Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Balin, Dwalin, Dori, Ori, Fili and Kili.

A touch down south are Pippin, Peregrin and Gimli. Gandalf and Samwise are together in the centre. 🧝

But as much as we hate to be the bearers of bad news, Geldrop doesn’t exactly look like a village in Lord of the Rings. Really, it looks more like most Dutch towns but with a bit more pizzazz, to say the least.

Bilbo is nowhere to be found

Bilbo Baggins, despite being a protagonist in the series, doesn’t have a single street named after him. Neither does Gollum or any other ‘evil’ character — except for Saruman.

Maybe they put on the ring and became invisible.

Have you visited this Lord of the Rings village? Tell us in the comments!

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in November 2019 and was fully updated in October 2023 for your reading pleasure.