Nuenen's many home weavers in the 1980s quickly captured Vincent's interest. His fascination is easily fed: as many as one-third of the male inhabitants are weavers by profession. Women help with spinning or yarn winding. 'My head is not in the direction of writing and I have little time for it because when I am not at Moe's I am near here with a weaver, of whom I have 2 painted studies in hand,' he wrote to Theo in January 1884.
The weavers in Nuenen perform their work at home; the loom is in the house or in a barn on a loam floor. The small spaces get in Vincent's way: 'These looms are difficult to draw because in the small rooms one cannot take his distance to 'draw the loom [...] However, I have found a room here where there are two looms & where it can be done'. The weavers lead a barren existence. In the first half of 1884 Vincent devoted some thirty paintings and drawings to the artisans. Their tools also form a motif: 'I am also painting a loom - of old greenish-brown oak - in which the year 1730 is carved. Near that loom, at a little window through which one can see a green field, stands a high chair, and the little child sits in it for hours watching the to and fro of the weaver's bobbin. Although he depicts the interior spaces mostly without details, in a few works they receive more attention. The dwellings are mostly difficult to identify.
Vincent is in contact with several weavers who model for him, including Toon Swinkels, Peter Smulders and Pieter Dekkers. Swinkels lives in a dilapidated house on the Berg, and Vincent is said to have spent three months painting in his father's weaving shop. Dekkers, whose son Driek collected bird's nests for Vincent, lived just outside the village at De Rijt 2; both houses were demolished over time.
Of Nuenen's numerous weaver houses, only a few have survived. One is located in the center on the present Berg, a stone's throw from the rectory. Although unsupportable by evidence, it is plausible that Vincent knew the cottage not only from the outside, but also from the inside. The property is believed to have been built in 1763 as a weaver's house. After several owners, weaver Willem van der Burg buys the house in 1869, after which it remains in family ownership for a century. Willem's daughter is sexton of the reformed congregation and lives there until 1967.
After a renovation in 2017, it serves as an overnight shelter under the name "The Sexton's Cottage. This building can serve as pars pro toto for the many weaver's houses Vincent visits.
