Save | Change the City. UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01 by CIVA

UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

CIVA FOUNDATION

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II. DEMOLITION FRENZY 1950-1960

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III. TIMELINE

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DE GULDEN SLOPERSHAMER/LA PIOCHE D’OR 1982 and 1988.. . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 VISUAL INVENTORY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – 1988. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

THE “LIVRES BLANCS POUR LA RÉAFFECTATION DU PATRIMOINE ARCHITECTURAL”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

EVOLUTIONARY TREE TO THE YEAR 2000. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 THE MODERNISATION OF BRUSSELS.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 BRUSSELISATION 1950-1975. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 THE BATTLE OF LA MAROLLE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 THE ARAU: THE RIGHT TO THE CITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 THE CREATION OF THE ARCHIVES D’ARCHITECTURE MODERNE (AAM) . . . 11 ITT: THE TRANSLUCENT TOWER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

I. ARCHITECTURE ON PAPER

ABOUT SEVERAL RESCUE CAMPAIGNS BEFORE AND AFTER 1989. . . . . . . . . 26 FORUM LOUIZA, ALIAS WILTCHER’S – 1988. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

IV. ABOUT SIX KEY PROJECTS

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V. ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS

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LUDIC COUNTER-PROJECTS 1970-1975. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 ACTIVIST COUNTER-PROJECTS 1975-1979. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

THE FOUNDATION OF THE SINT-LUKASARCHIEF IN 1968.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 REDISCOVERING HORTA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 THE QUARTIER NORD: “MINI-MANHATTAN”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 BRUSSELS, CITY OF A HUNDRED RESIDENTS’ COMMITTEES.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 THE “AGGLO”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 THE MAELBEEK VALLEY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 A MUSEUM OF MODERN ART FOR BRUSSELS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

VI. UNBUILT

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VII. ON THE BARRICADES FOR ARCHITECTURAL CONSERVATION

VIII. VISUALS

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URGENCY INVENTORY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 MAURICE CULOT AND LA CAMBRE .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 MUNTHOF/HÔTEL DES MONNAIES MUST NOT BE DESTROYED ! – 1979.. . . . 18 BRUSSELS, BUILDING AND RE-BUILDING : ARCHITECTURE AND EMBELLISHMENT OF THE CITY 1780 – 1914. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 STREETS AND STONES. BRUSSELS : URBAN GROWTH 1780 – 1980. . . . . . . . 20 THE ARCHIVES D’ARCHITECTURE MODERNE ABROAD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 THE AAM AFTER 1980. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

I. ARCHITECTURE ON PAPER

The late 1960s saw the establishment of two non-profit organisations, the Archives d’Architecture Moderne and the Sint-Lukasarchief, which would both play a key role in the effort to safeguard the architectural heritage and urban fabric of Brussels over the following decades. Both sought to resist the property-development steamroller and the tabula rasa policy championed by functionalists, amid the indifference if not complicity of a national government that had little concern for the quality of life the inhabitants and no interest in safeguarding their living environment. Established on the initiative of architect and engineer Alfons Hoppenbrouwers and inspired by the architectural teaching of the SintLukas schools, the Sint-Lukasarchief was concerned first of all with the fate of 19th-century revivalist, Art Nouveau, Art Déco and Modernist buildings, and made its mark in compiling an inventory of Brussels’ architectural heritage. From the beginning, it was clear to them that heritage conservation had to form part of an overall urban development plan that would underwrite the economic value of older buildings and so ensure their preservation. The Archives d’Architecture Moderne (AAM), for its part, was set up by three architects from the La Cambre school – Maurice Culot, Bernard De Walque and François Terlinden – whose rediscovery of two major Modernist architects, Antoine Pompe and Fernand Bodson, would lead them to research a whole generation of architects lost to history. They organised a first exhibition entitled «Antoine Pompe et l’effort moderne en Belgique” [Antoine Pompe and the Modernist Endeavour in Belgium], which served as a nucleus for the formation of the first archive of architectural documents in Belgium. The two organisations would campaign for the conservation of the architectural heritage and undertake research and scholarly study in the field. In the process, they constituted a library, a resource centre and an archive of architects’ papers, this last all the more important for such records interesting no-one else at all at the time. Since then these collections have continuously expanded, and have been consulted by generations of students, researchers, activists, architects and planners, as well as providing the raw materials for publications and exhibitions. From the start, the two organisations linked their own campaigning to the planning struggles they did much to support, the AAM notably through the counter-projects offered in opposition to destructive development schemes, the Sint-Lukasarchief in compiling the first inventory of the built heritage of the Belgian capital, which served as a basis for the official inventory that would follow.

Since 1 January 2017, both organisations have been united within the CIVA Foundation, to form its department of Modern Architecture, thus bringing about the creation of one of the most extensive collections of architectural archives in Europe. The present exhibition retraces the history of their activities and also includes, in a section entitled “Unbuilt Brussels”, a selection of architectural drawings from the collection.

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I. ARCHITECTURE ON PAPER

II. DEMOLITION FRENZY 1950-1960 1950 and 1960 were particularly tragic years for Brussels. The list of valuable urban planning structures, residential buildings and public buildings that disappeared under the wrecking ball for the benefit of the so-called modernisation of the city is striking. In addition to several important Art Nouveau monuments, it was mainly 19th century architecture, neo-styles and eclectic architecture that suffered most under this demolition frenzy. The Centrale Hallen/Halles Centrales (Central Halls) by architect Léon Suys were demolished to build Parking 58 car park, the covered market by architect Jean-Pierre Cluysenaar at the Congreskolom/Colonne du Congrès (Congress Column) was demolished to build the esplanade and the government administrative centre. The North Station by architect François Coppens and the South Station by architect Auguste Payen disappeared to make way for the construction of the North-South rail connection

III. TIMELINE 1. EVOLUTIONARY TREE TO THE YEAR 2000 CHARLES JENCKS, ARCHITECTURE 2000, PREDICTIONS AND METHODS, 1971. This soft and shapeless diagram created by the architecture theoretician Charles Jencks in 1971 depicts the international time portrait of architecture, from 1920 onwards with a prognosis until the year 2000. This exhibition covers the period from 1968 onwards. in this time of controversies, contemplation and renewal, the diagram shows how completely different architectural trends live and evolve together.

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THE ZEITGEIST The large-scale approach of project developers and property developers, supported by a number of politicians, was proclaimed as one of the action items for the May ‘68 movement in Brussels. This movement was reflected first and foremost in the fight for preserving and improving local living conditions and the overall environment of the city. The alienation of humans from their environment could no longer continue : architects and city planners could no longer be dictatorial and dirigist towards contractors and society. The architect had to practice self-negation, while there was also no solution to be found for architecture and urban planning with sociologists and economists. What a ‘planner architect’ did have to be was a catalyst, and this meant capturing and giving shape to the wishes of the people, this is making architecture and urban planning with a democratic attitude. The architect also had to be a political activist, a fighter in the underground and on the barricades. In any case the architect would NOT impose his or her knowledge, skills and views and above all authority on the people, but would work as part of the community, with an anti-authoritarian attitude which would move this community. To do this, the condition was to belong to that community and counteract or prevent any formation of interest groups. The influence exerted by this movement expressed itself in architecture and urban planning in the transition from large scale to the idea of small scale. Preservation, reuse and rehabilitation of the existing building heritage and new constructions that fit into the housing and living context are concepts that were formed after May ‘68 and later reactivated by the looming economic crisis. ‘Redevelopment = demolition’ was replaced by renovation, revaluation, improving housing and the living environment.

2. THE MODERNISATION OF BRUSSELS Things that the authorities managed to keep relatively under control in some other cities exploded in Brussels. Not to the extent of demand ; demands were created, and markets were then established in order to

be saturated. This bears witness to a megalomania which has become a disgrace in some places: the urban motorways ; the Noordwijk/Quartier Nord (Northern Quarter) and the World Trade Center; the destruction of the fabric of the city centre, the tower blocks, the Europakruispunt/ Carrefour de l’Europe square in front of Brussels Central Station, etc.

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This was also the time of Jane Jacobs (The death and life of great American cities), Marshall Mc Luhan (Culture is our Business), Manfredo Tafuri (Teoria e storia dell’architettura - Theories and history of architecture), Alvin Toffler (Future Shock), Umberto Eco (La struttura assente The Absent Structure), Robert Venturi (Complexity and contradiction in architecture and Learning from Las Vegas) and the architectural group Archigram...

3. BRUSSELISATION 1950-1975 The architectural heritage of Brussels is overwhelmingly from the 19th century, a heritage that was not sufficiently known and valued. We had to wait until the end of the 1960s before Art Nouveau once again received the recognition it deserved as an architectural expression. Unfortunately, by then a number of irreplaceable masterpieces had already been demolished. On the eve of the European Year of Architectural heritage (1975), Brussels was an underdeveloped area when it came to urban development and architectural heritage, for the following reasons: • the administrative apparatus protecting architectural heritage weighed heavy, was slow and was buckling under its own complexity; • the pressure of the tertiary sector that had already hung over Brussels for several decades was disastrous for the normal fabric of the city, which was previously on a smaller scale; • the heritage itself consisted for the most part of architecture about which there were too many misunderstandings, an architecture that was not at all appraised at its real value and thus remained misunderstood.

4. THE BATTLE OF LA MAROLLE In the late 1960s the Belgian government decided to extend the Palais de Justice to the northwest, that is, over the working class neighbourhood of Les Marolles that lay beneath. This was to be demolished, a fate its 1,200 inhabitants learnt of in a letter announcing their forthcoming expulsion. A response was rapidly organised, headed by the charismatic figure of Jacques Van Der Biest, the parish priest. This received extensive press coverage, which alerted public opinion, and in the end the Ministry of Justice gave way. The battle of La Marolle represented a turning point for planning campaigns in Brussels: it was the first fight won by residents against a plan that would destroy their neighbourhood and the life they lived there.

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5. THE ARAU: THE RIGHT TO THE CITY Set up in 1969 by sociologist René Schoonbrodt, the Atelier de Recherche et d’Action Urbaines [Urban Research and Action Workshop] brought together academics, architects and others to fight against the destruction of Brussels and champion the right to the city. In those days, under the combined effect of capitalist pressures, a laissez-faire political class, hungry property developers and the functionalist modernism that prevailed among architects and planners, whole neighbourhoods were razed to make way for high-rise blocks and urban motorways. In direct opposition to the Athens Charter, which championed urban clearance and the separation of functions, the ARAU has theorised an urban development based on density, social diversity and mixed use. In terms of urban form, the ARAU argues for the reconstruction of the city on the basis of the existing fabric, in the forms inherited from the past: terraced buildings, streets and squares. All this it believes provides the best social and spatial conditions for all to enjoy the right to the city. The ARAU has campaigned too for greater transparency and democracy in the planning permission process, leading to the introduction of the publicité-concertation [advertise and consult] procedure of public inquiries publicised by the well-known red posters. It also constantly monitors planning proposals, analysing and criticizing the projects brought forward, most often developing counter-projects in collaboration with the Archives d’Architecture Moderne. Furthermore, the ARAU helps sustain public debate by organising an annual school on urban issues that focuses on a different theme year, an institution that did much to lay the ground for regionalisation. And finally, the ARAU organises the first policy-oriented guided tours of Brussels, making residents aware of urban issues and of the importance of safeguarding an architectural heritage under constant threat.

6. THE CREATION OF THE ARCHIVES D’ARCHITECTURE MODERNE (AAM)

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There would, however, follow a decades-long struggle for the renewal of the neighbourhood while maintaining its residents in place, and it was in the course of this that Jacques Van Der Biest would meet René Schoonbrodt and not long afterwards Maurice Culot.

In 1968, Maurice Culot rented a house built by architect Fernand Bodson in Rue de l’Ermitage/Kluisstraat. In the cellar he found a plan for a Maison du Peuple in Liège, dated 1917, signed by Bodson and Antoine Pompe, a romantic rationalist by then forgotten who had played a major role in the Modern movement. This was the starting point for Culot’s rediscovery of Belgian Modernist architecture before the functionalist turn. Wishing to demonstrate the wealth and diversity of this architecture and by doing so to denounce the hijacking of modernism by the functionalists, in 1969 Culot joined with former classmates Bernard De Walque and François Terlinden, and also Robert Delevoy, director of the La Cambre school, to found the Archives d’Architecture Moderne in order to conserve the architectural record. A first exhibition was staged at the Musée d’Ixelles under the title “Antoine Pompe et l’Effort Moderne en Belgique 1890 – 1940”. The association thereafter continued to collect the archives of these forgotten architects and to promote them through books, exhibitions and a journal – AAM – created in 1975. Culot’s 1969 encounter with Jacques Van Der Biest, parish priest of Les Marolles, and especially his meeting with René Schoonbrodt, with whom he would set up the ARAU, saw him put his philosophy of the counter-project in the service of urban struggles in Brussels.

7. ITT: THE TRANSLUCENT TOWER In 1972, ITT sought to build its new European headquarters on the corner of Avenue Louise/Louisalaan and Avenue De Motlaan, i.e. directly overlooking the historic Abbaye de la Cambre, while threatening to move to Paris should the City of Brussels refuse. This jobs blackmail on the city authorities paid off, and Paul Vanden Boeynants, the deputy burgomaster responsible, granted planning permission even before the local development plan was finalised. In the face of the fears expressed by the residents the ARAU supported in their campaign, the future prime minister Vanden Boeynants came out with this notable declaration: “The view will not be in the least impaired by the planned tower. For this will be an entirely translucent tower, and as such will certainly not have an unfavourable impact on the view.”

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The Sint-Lukasarchief was founded at the initiative of Alfons Hoppen brouwers as an answer to the apathy and incomprehension which our architectural and urban planning heritage was dealt with as an inherent part of our environment after the Second World War. After all, an astonishing number of things had been lost, both in terms of quantity and quality, partly due to a lack of interest and knowledge, and partly due to ignorance. From concrete rescue operations to city activism, from research, publications raising awareness via high-profile exhibitions, the SintLukasarchief made concrete contributions to the preservation and redevelopment of urban planning and architectural heritage and the promotion of image quality in the city. Sint-Lukasarchief thus built up an active archive with documents, iconographic material and documentation and went beyond pure archiving and preservation of movable heritage. THE COGELS-OSY PROJECT For this project, Alfons Hoppenbrouwers gathered around him a team of young architects, Rudi Somers, Patrick Labarque and Jos Vandenbreeden, who worked on a revival project at the end of 1971 and start of 1972 for the Cogels-Osy neighbourhood in Berchem (Antwerp), on behalf of the Ministerie van Nederlandse Cultuur (Ministry of Flemish Culture) and minister Frans Van Mechelen. Part of this 19th century neighbourhood would be protected as a city landscape; 17 buildings, which corresponded to 51 house numbers because different residential buildings formed larger wholes, were proposed for protection as listed buildings. In addition, suggestions were made regarding new constructions, renovation, diverting through traffic, making part of the green area within the housing blocks into a public space, etc. The answer also contained the Cogels-Osy-Centrum, a newbuild sub-city centre that would become a multidimensional centre for culture and recreation, as well as offices and shops. Protection didn’t mean much in itself, but had to fit within the context of an overall urban planning scheme and process, which ensured economic rehabilitation and through this, the preservation of heritage.

9. REDISCOVERING HORTA Encouraged by Alfons Hoppenbrouwers, in 1968, during his architecture studies, Jos Vandenbreeden started research on the architect Victor Horta, after a visit by the Dutch architect Herman Hertzberger to Brussels awakened his interest in Horta and Art Nouveau. This study developed from a meticulous redrawing of Horta’s most important buildings – the

majority of Horta’s archive had gone missing –, from an analysis of his plans, to the publication in 1972 of the book Het Hortamuseum and in 1975, together with Alfons Hoppenbrouwers, the book Victor Horta, architectonografie. We interpreted Horta’s architectural message subjectively by applying keys from our architectural issues of the time to his architecture: 1968, a period of ‘back to nature’. In his architecture, we recognised a people-oriented pursuit at one with nature, that he emphasised symbolically in space, with daylight and atmosphere. This offered both a varied and essential starting point.

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8. THE FOUNDATION OF THE SINT-LUKASARCHIEF IN 1968

10. THE QUARTIER NORD: “MINI-MANHATTAN” In the late 1950s, commissioned by deputy mayor for planning Paul Vanden Boeynants and inspired by American practice, architects and planning consultants Groupe Structures proposed to raze the whole of the Quartier Nord/Noordwijk (Northern Quarter) to erect a business centre consisting of several tower-blocks linked by a deck thirteen metres above the ground. Pedestrians would circulate on the deck, cars beneath. Charles De Pauw, a developer specialising in multi-storey car parks, was the first to be attracted by the project and became the leading figure in its realisation. 786 buildings were to be compulsorily purchased and 12,000 residents thrown out of their homes, with only some rehoused. By the late 1970s, the operation had for the most part come to nothing, only a few of the towers having been built, though most of the residents had already been forced out. One would have to wait for the late 1980s and economic recovery to see construction begin again, this time under the aegis of Charles’s son Patrick De Pauw.

11. BRUSSELS, CITY OF A HUNDRED RESIDENTS’ COMMITTEES In the late 1960s, growing awareness of industrial development’s negative effects on the environment led to the emergence of a Green movement that came to intersect with the equally new campaigns around urban issues within a federation of local organisations named Inter-Environnement, founded in 1971 by Michel Didisheim. Didisheim was chief of staff to Prince Albert (the king’s brother and heir presumptive to the Belgian throne) and chairman of the non-profit conservation

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12. THE “AGGLO” In 1968, the Belgian government decided to initiate a double process of decentralisation of state power and fusion of communes, until then the basic local government unit. This led to the creation in 1971 of a local authority (the Collège d’Agglomération, known as the Agglo) covering the 19 communes of the Brussels metropolitan area. Among the functions it took over from them was that of planning, responsibility for which fell to alderman Serge Moureaux. He introduced overall development plans and building regulations in an effort to bring some order to uncontrolled urban development in the capital, but came up against resistance from the communes. In 1974, Guy Cudell, the then minister for Brussels affairs, gave in to the demands of the residents’ committees, who sought a defensive sector plan that would protect housing from invasive office development. After a long legal battle with the Brussels communes, such a plan

was finally adopted in 1976 by his successor Paul Vanden Boeynants. In 1977, the Agglo set up a property administration that acquired land to halt speculation and carried out urban renovation projects, notably in the Rue Aux Laines/Wolstraat and the Quartier Botanique/Kruidentuin-wijk. Responsibility for culture and education lay with two committees of the Agglo, one for each language community, the French Cultural Committee being headed by Jean-Pierre Poupko. With these powers, the metropolitan authority campaigned to raise awareness of Brussels’ architectural heritage and funded many studies and designs in the endeavour to safeguard it, a good many of them carried out by the AAM, notably the Livres blancs du Patrimoine (white papers on architectural heritage). The guiding principles of planning policy outlined in the Agglo brochure entitled Options et Directives are quite evidently indebted to the work of the ARAU, the AAM and the neighbourhood committees: safeguarding housing; consultation with residents; preservation of the living environment, of green spaces in particular; ensuring mixed-use neighbourhoods to promote “the city” as “place of encounter”, conservation and restoration of the architectural heritage; rejection of inner-urban motorways and the discouragement of car traffic in the city centre.

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association for the Quartier des Arts/Kunstwijk (Art District). René Schoonbrodt was chair of the Brussels district organisation. In 1974, growing regionalism led to the division of the national organisation into separate structures serving French-speaking Wallonia and Dutch-speaking Flanders, while Brussels was covered by InterEnvironnement Bruxelles (IEB) on the one hand and the Brusselse Raad voor het Leefmilieu on the other. IEB – of which the Atelier de Recherche et d’Action Urbaines (ARAU) and the AAM were members – would concentrate first of all on the threat to housing represented by uncontrolled office development in residential neighbourhoods and the ravages caused by the construction of inner-urban motorways, offering support and assistance to neighbourhood committees that mobilised against such projects. Its first victory was the introduction of the local development plan and the public consultation process, which brought planning decisions into the light of day. From 1976 onward, the IEB would inform its members – some hundred residents’ and neighbourhood committees – of planning applications submitted, assisting them in their campaigns and supporting them in consultations. The model of the city it defended was in general terms that developed by the ARAU and given formal expression in the AAM’s counter-projects. Its field of activity would gradually expand from planning questions to environmental issues more generally.

13. THE MAELBEEK VALLEY Since the late 1960s, the valley of the Maelbeek has been under enormous pressure, with plans for an expressway linking the outer ring road in the south to the Quartier Européen/Europese Wijk, the widening of Rue Graystraat, building around Place Jourdan, and the development of the Quartier Européen/Europese Wijk on either side of the Chaussée d’Etterbeekselaan, whose buildings have now been largely demolished. In 1976, plans for a 33-storey building on the Rue Froissartstraat side of the Place Jourdan led to a mobilisation of local people, who the following year would face plans to build four high-rises on interlinked bases between Rue Gray and Rue du Maelbeeklaan. The Maelbeek committees and Inter-Environnement Bruxelles put forward a counter-project (developed by La Cambre students) that proposed the rebuilding of two closed blocks separated by a pedestrian thoroughfare between Rue Graystraat and the Rue du Maelbeeklaan, and a semi-open block giving onto Parc Léopold on the Rue Froissartstraat side of Place Jourdanplaats.

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In 1972, the ministry of public works planned to build a museum of modern art in the neighbourhood of the Place Royal/Koningsplein. The project was confided to architect Roger Bastin, who proposed to bury the museum under square itself and replace the buildings on the Rue Montagne de la Cour/Hofberg with a windowless rectangular block serving as entrance and signal the museum’s presence. The Ligue Esthétique Belge was scandalised by this desecration of the neoclassical unity of the Place Royale, as were Inter-Environnement, the ARAU and the AAM. The plans led to furious debate. Bastin’s building would never be realised, but the museum would indeed be built underneath what is today the Place du Musée/Museumplein. The buildings of Rue Montagne de la Cour/Hofberg would finally be demolished some years later, to meet the Royal Museums’ need for office space. The ARAU had fought to save them, arguing for the rebuilding of the street and recommending the completion of the corner with the Place du Musée/Museumplein by the re-erection of the façade of Victor Horta’s Hôtel Aubecq.

15. URGENCY INVENTORY On the eve of the European Year of Architectural heritage – 1975 – the urban area of Brussels was underdeveloped. On 31 December 1974 there were only 32 protected monuments. There was no responsible and objective knowledge of already existing heritage, specifying the standards practised and general criteria. At the time, making an inventory of Brussels architecture and city planning and making it understandable was just as crucial for its preservation and protection as it was for the enforcement of the typical character of the capital’s urban area. It was against this background that the Sint-Lukasarchief set up the Urgency Inventory on behalf of the Nederlandse Commissie voor de Cultuur van de Brussels Agglomeratie (Dutch-speaking Commission for Culture of the Brussels Urban Area, now the Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie or Flemish Community Commission.) The Urgency Inventory was published in February 1979. At the time it was already clear that heritage management had to be handled within the whole package of architectural and city planning, socio-economic and cultural structures and that the viewpoints thus taken had to lead to collectively oriented policymaking. The fact that the Urgency Inventory was never confirmed in legislation, nor recognised by the Koninklijke Commissie voor Monumenten en

Landschappen (Royal Commission for Monuments and Landscapes) has naturally affected its influence on town planning and architectural policy. But the Urgency Inventory was avidly used as an ‘interesting and indispensable’ working tool by the various city councils, town planning and development departments, heritage managers... and by everyone who was and is concerned with town planning and architecture and heritage.

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14. A MUSEUM OF MODERN ART FOR BRUSSELS

RENOVATION AND PROTECTION OF WOLSTRAAT/RUE AUX LAINES The early 20th century town houses on Wolstraat/Rue aux Laines escaped demolition in a remarkable way. The properties were bought up for the value of the land, and the buyers wanted to carry out a speculative property transaction. A design for a so-called ‘renovation’, complete demolition and construction of spacious apartment buildings by the architectural firm Henri Montois was proposed in 1975. However, it was still too close in time to the May ‘68 movement and various action committees, including the Sint-Lukasarchief and entities such as the Agglomeratieraad Brussel/ Agglomération Bruxelloise (Brussels administration now replaced by the Brussels-Capital Region), carried out actions. Not only had the construction of the Hilton hotel already had a harmful effect on Egmontpark/Parc d’Egmont, but the historic neighbourhood of the Grote Zavel/Grand Sablon and Kleine Zavel/Petit Sablon would also be spared from an unsuitable project. The preservation of Wolstraat/Rue aux Laines launched the idea that ‘ordinary’ living in old buildings could evolve into a certain form of ‘elysian’ living, thanks to the neighbourhood’s architectural value and its significance from an urban development perspective.

16. MAURICE CULOT AND LA CAMBRE Former La Cambre student Maurice Culot caught the attention of the school’s director Robert-Louis Delevoy with speeches he made in the context of May ’68, and then a few months later with the exhibition” Antoine Pompe ou l’Effort Moderne” that he organised with François Terlinden at the Musée d’Ixelles. Delevoy then invited Culot to teach architectural history and urban planning, before appointing him, jointly with Marcel Pesleux, a course leader in architecture. Under him, the students were asked to conceive schemes for the repair of the urban fabric that were put into use in popular struggles around planning. This engagement with concrete issues helped students develop an awareness of policy issues and a sense of the architect’s social responsibility. While some have accused Culot of an almost Stalinist dogmatism, it has to be recognised that many of his students would excel

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17. MUNTHOF/HÔTEL DES MONNAIES MUST NOT BE DESTROYED ! – 1979 Exactly 100 years after it was built, Munthof/Hôtel des Monnaies was threatened with demolition. It was constructed in 1879 according to the design by the architect Armand Roussel in Louis XIII style. The building housed the administration as well as the premises where the Belgian currency was minted, an industrial archaeology monument. The building was preserved intact. Unfortunately the wrecking ball is seldom synonymous with cultural progress : with the destruction of the Munthof/ Hôtel des Monnaies, a building that could rival the most important examples of monumental heritage in Brussels disappeared. The promise to build homes, a sports hall and car park and set up green areas was never honoured. Only one public green area, an open car park and a playground were created.

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in the profession, among them Dominique Delbrouck, Brigitte D’Helft, Patrice Neyrinck, Michel Verliefden, Sefik Birkiye, Elie Levy, Anne Van Loo, Philippe Lefebvre and Caroline Mierop, to mention only a few. This was sparked off in 1979, when Maurice Culot published an article in the international architectural magazine Lotus roundly denouncing the activities, at the La Cambre architecture school and in the profession in general, of a “reactionary” group whose professional commitments were a cloak for the interests of the right as they promoted a functionalism entirely in the service of capital and attacked new approaches being tried at the school because they threatened their corporate interests. This was for some the final straw, and on the instigation of education minister Jacques Hoyaux, Culot and some thirty of his teacher colleagues found themselves dismissed. The school exploded: there were demonstrations, strikes, protests of all kinds, and international support, but all in vain. The next year, the sacked teachers set up an alternative school in Rue Blanche/Wittestraat, in Ixelles, where they were followed by a number of students, but this failed to survive for lack of funds. Culot went into exile in Paris, where he was involved in the launch of the Institut Français d’Architecture (IFA), as head of its Department of History and Archives, which he would develop along the lines of the Archives d’Architecture Moderne in Brussels. His work in the conservation of archives and of the French architectural heritage won him the recognition of the French state, which made him an Officier des Arts et Lettres and awarded him the Ordre du Mérite.

18. BRUSSELS, BUILDING AND RE-BUILDING : ARCHITECTURE AND EMBELLISHMENT OF THE CITY 1780 – 1914 The exhibition “Brussel, breken, bouwen/Bruxelles, construire et reconstruire” (Brussels, building and re-building) with the catalogue of the same name was organised by the Nederlandse Commissie voor de Cultuur van de Brussels agglomeratie (Dutch-speaking Commission for Culture of the Brussels Urban Area), now the Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie (Flemish Community Commission) in cooperation with Gemeentekrediet van België/ Crédit Communal de Belgique, Sint-Lukasarchief and Gustave Abeels. It was shown at Passage 44 from 12 September 1979 to 28 October 1979. When putting together this exhibition, we noticed on the one hand that apart from a few fragments, Brussels was completely rebuilt in the 19th century. But on the other, after the Second World War, the quite intact building stock had repeatedly become a tableau of so-called ‘progressive’ architectural and urban planning renewal. From that point on we could speak of an uncoordinated and imposed growth process, a large-scale unregulated building explosion, in which a global and responsible approach with respect to the valuable architectural and urban development heritage was completely absent. The development of the tertiary sector with its associated commercial and speculative interests driven by developers’ construction have more than once had harmful effects on the integrated growth process of the city and above all on the previously small-scale architectural fabric, the housing stock. The chaotic effect of traffic planning not coordinated with other areas such as culture, the environment, heritage preservation and housing through the laying of urban motorways, car park buildings, ring road tunnels, viaducts, etc. had affected the city fabric and architecture more dramatically than ever. Too little was still known about the 19th century architectural heritage, which was covered in detail for the first time under the title : Luister van de 19de-eeuwse gevel (Splendour of the 19th century façade) and it did not yet enjoy the respect and appreciation it deserved. The exhibition took a first step in this direction, but politics barely followed.

19. STREETS AND STONES. BRUSSELS : URBAN GROWTH 1780 – 1980 The exhibition ‘Straten en Stenen/Pierres et Rues’ (Streets and Stones) with the catalogue of the same name was organised by the Generale Bankmaatschappij/Generale de Banque (Belgian national bank) in cooperation with Sint-Lukasarchief and Gustave Abeels. It was shown at the

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20. THE ARCHIVES D’ARCHITECTURE MODERNE ABROAD The publishing house, the AAM journal, the exhibitions, the artistic activities and the counter-projects developed at La Cambre would gain the Archives d’Architecture Moderne a reputation in Belgium and further afield. Among the AAM’s bestsellers one might mention Léon Krier’s Rational Architecture (1978), an international success; the first monograph on Rob Mallet-Stevens (1980); and Pierre Ansay and René Schoonbrodt’s Penser la Ville (1989), several times reprinted. Between 1975 and 1990, the journal AAM published projects and work by historians and architects from different countries, and is now considered to be one of the most significant architectural publications of the 1970s. Under Robert-Louis Delevoy, the art historian and director of the La Cambre school, links were formed with schools in France and Italy, and above all with the Architectural Association School in London under its

Canadian director Alvin Boyarsky. This allowed the AAM to tour exhibitions on Art Nouveau, L.-H. De Koninck, Antoine Pompe, Renaat Braem and others. Teacher-architects such as Bernard Huet, Bernard Tschumi, Antoine Grumbach, Peter Cook, Colin Fournier, Roland Castro, Philippe Panerai, Fernando Montes, Charles Jencks, Pierluigi Nicolin and Dario Matteoni became friends and supporters of the organisation. In Paris, François Chaslin and Michelle Champenois opened the pages of Le Monde and Macadam to the association, while Georges Charbonnier offered it a platform at France Culture. The magazine Architecture d’Aujourd’hui featured the Brussels counter-projects on its front cover, and other periodicals such as Oppositions in the United States, Lotus and Vittorio Gregotti’s Rassegna in Italy and the AA Quarterly in Britain published articles or entire special issues on the AAM and its activities. And in 1977, Architectural Design devoted an issue to Manfredo Tafuri, Léon Krier and Maurice Culot. Thanks to the architect Jean Dethier, a collaboration was established between the AAM and the Centre Pompidou, leading to exhibitions such as Jean-Baptiste Godin and Intérieurs (photographs by Sophie Ristelhueber and François Hers). From 1980 onward, and notably with the creation of the Institut Français d’Architecture, exchanges with France would considerably expand in terms of loans of exhibitions or archive materials. The association also tendered for work on European architectural heritage projects, notably inventorying the architectural and industrial heritage of Northern France, leading to the publication of the two volumes Le Siècle de l’éclectisme and Les Châteaux de l’industrie, which played a key role in saving many buildings under threat. Architect and historian Francis Strauven, one of the AAM’s directors, has done much to make the organisation and its work known in Flanders and the Netherlands, editing a special issue of the Dutch magazine TABK and writing books on Flemish architects whose archives are in its keeping, Renaat Braem, Jos Bascourt and Albert Bontridder among them. And finally, the Prix Européen pour la Reconstruction de la Ville [European Prize for Urban Reconstruction] established by Philippe Rotthier in 1980 has given the AAM access to an extensive pool of foreign contacts.

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counter area of the bank at Ravensteinstraat/rue Raveinstein 29 (now demolished) from 18 November 1982 to 21 January 1983. The urban planning changes that the Brussels pentagon underwent over two centuries are remarkable. They were illustrated using five chosen themes : • The Guimard period and classical urban planning with the late 18th century transformation of the upper city ; The period of mayor Jules Anspach in the second half of the 19th century with the covering of the river Zenne/Senne, the construction of the central avenues and the Palais de Justice/Justitiepaleis (Palace of Justice) ; • The period of mayor Charles Buls at the end of the 19th century with the revaluation of urban planning, which had expanded ; The construction of the North-South rail connection with the demolition of the Putterij/Putterie neighbourhood ; • Urban planning after the Second World War : from high rises to soft involvement and participation. Why was this exhibition held in 1982? The economic crisis meant that many things had come to a standstill and that urban planning in that period was more theoretical than practical. At the time, we lived in what was a moment of contemplation, so to speak. The exhibition intended to recall the exciting evolution of the growth of Brussels as a city, from which the public, experts and politicians could learn lessons themselves... which unfortunately the latter did not do.

21. THE AAM AFTER 1980 On leaving Brussels for Paris, Maurice Culot handed over the day-today running of the AAM to architect Anne Van Loo and art historian Annick Brauman, though he remained managing director and head of the publishing house. The organisation now focussed on expanding and

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cataloguing its holdings and exploiting them through the publication of books and the organisation of exhibitions via the Fondation pour l’Architecture under Caroline Mierop. She and Anne Van Loo had been Culot’s assistants at La Cambre. In furtherance of its objects, the AAM would produce, on behalf of the public authorities (the Commission française de la Culture de l’Agglomération Bruxelloise, the Communauté Française, the Secrétariat d’Etat à la Région Bruxelloise, and also the Fondation Roi Baudouin) a great number of studies that identified, with a view to their conservation, whole swathes of an architectural patrimony at that time but little known. To raise awareness among the public at large, the AAM produced the first guides to Art Nouveau and Art Déco architecture in Brussels, which included mapped walks that allowed those interested to hunt out the still surviving treasures of our heritage. The organisation has not for all that abandoned its campaigning, and it regularly intervenes in consultations to defend architectural heritage under threat.

22. DE GULDEN SLOPERSHAMER/ LA PIOCHE D’OR 1982 AND 1988 The Gulden Slopershamer/Pioche d’Or [Golden Wrecking Ball] prize rewarded the perpetrators of misdeeds in the form of demolition works that had made the greatest contribution to the degradation of Brussels. It covered four categories: the Prijs van de Gulden Slopershamer, the Prijs van de vergulde Bulldozer [Gilded Bulldozer Prize], the Prijs van de zilveren Betonmolen [Silver Concrete Mixer Prize] and the Prijs van de Merula Lacrimans [Dry Rot Prize]. The prize was organised by the Brussels Centrum voor heden daagse Archeologie (Brussels Centre for Modern Archaeology), in collaboration with Sint-Lukasarchief, Archives d’Architecture Moderne and Inter-Environnement. On 29 September 1982, just before the municipal council elections, the first Golden Wrecking Ball prize was awarded. In the period before 1982, more than six hundred buildings were demolished ! But after they had rediscovered their renowned dynamism, the healthy efforts of the demolishers allowed them to surpass themselves once again. On 29 September 1988, they could pride themselves in having destroyed more than 700 buildings over a period of six years.

MAISONS DU PEUPLE In 1983, the government of the French-speaking community in Belgium asked the Archives d’Architecture Moderne to compile an inventory of Maisons du Peuple (Houses of the People) created as centres of working-class organisation, education and recreation. The eight-volume study was authored by Brigitte Buyssens and published by the AAM.

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23. VISUAL INVENTORY

INDUSTRIAL ARCHAEOLOGY OF GREATER BRUSSELS The year 1981 saw the publication of the Inventaire visuel de l’Archéologie industrielle de l’Agglomération de bruxelles, [Industrial Archaeology of Greater Brussels] the result of a two-year investigation by architects and art historians from the Archives d’Architecture Moderne (C. Mierop, P. Lenain, J.-P. Hoa, A. Van Loo, B. de Walque, P. Burniat, A. Lambrichs, R. De Gernier and J. Lange). The 18 volumes of the inventory record the industrial architectural heritage of Greater Brussels dating from 1800 to 1940, classified by commune and by industry. They contain more than a thousand dossiers detailing the technical and historical characteristics of the buildings, illustrated with photographs, plans and maps. The inventory offers an overview of a little known aspect of the architectural heritage and shows that the location of industrial buildings was governed by a logic of work that drew undertakings together in shared neighbourhoods. This work can inform future reflections of urban development and planning while also raising the question of the future uses of these buildings.

24. IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – 1988 In 1983 the first “In Memoriam Patrimonium’ action” was launched, highlighting several flagrant examples of the total lack of heritage policy. The press, the media and the general public showed a great interest in these exhibitions and press conferences at Sint-Lukas gallery on Paleizenstraat/Rue des Palais.

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IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – PART II – 1984 The following were denounced: the former Prévoyance Sociale building on Luchtvaartsquare/Square de l’Aviation by architect Maxime Brunfaut, completely neglected, original furnishings bargained away by the public buildings administration to a buyer, the building and printworks of Le Peuple newspaper by architect Maxime Brunfaut, completely neglected and ready for demolition, Barricadenplein/Place des Barricades due to the neglect of this important urban development and the completely derelict and ruined 17th century Beaulieu castle in Machelen, attributed to Lucas Faid’Herbe. IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – PART III ‘8 + 246’ – 1985 In the meantime, the two previous actions had received no response from the relevant authorities and the Koninklijke Commissie voor Monumenten en Landschappen (Royal Commission for Monuments and Landscapes). This is why the Sint-Lukasarchief set back the first 8 buildings and suggested 246 other sites to be protected as listed buildings, as a matter of urgency. These were included in the Urgentie-Inventaris (Urgency Inventory) as unique and very memorable buildings. Since the law of 7 august 1931 on the protection of listed buildings and landscapes, within a period of 54 years, Brussels only had 115 listed buildings. At this pace, the 8 + 246 proposed listed buildings would only all be protected by 2308. IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – PART IV – BRUSSELS TRAMPLED – 1987 The oldest residential heritage in Brussels consists of the stepped gables, which were inventoried and photographed from 1903 onwards by the Comité d’Etudes du Vieux Bruxelles (Old Brussels Studies Committee) under the chairmanship of the former mayor Charles Buls.

Fifty stepped gables were highlighted due to neglect, over-restoration and reconstruction in ‘vieux-neuf’ (old new) style. Only two stepped gables were protected as listed sites. They were also used to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Charles Buls’s year of birth.

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IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – NEW SADISM IN BRUSSELS ARCHITECTURE – PART I – 1983 Framed behind broken glass with all the other photos on the floor is how visitors could trample the denounced heritage with their feet, as the government did in reality. The following were denounced: the neglected Charle-Albert castle, the unprotected Otlet town house with its interior by Henry Van de Velde, the Saint-Cyr residence of architect Gustave Strauven, for which the Koninklijke Commissie voor Monumenten en Landschappen (Royal Commission for Monuments and Landscapes) had always issued a negative recommendation for protection since 1964, the Haerens residence on Brugmannlaan/Avenue Brugmann by architect Antoine Courtens, threatened with demolition at the time.

IN MEMORIAM PATRIMONIUM – PART V, 20TH CENTURY CONCERN OVER LACK OF CONSERVATION – 1968-1988 Over a period of 20 years, the Sint-Lukasarchief had given 1,374 opinions on architectural heritage and drawn up 252 protection files, for which no further action was taken by the authorities in most cases. The dramatic situation in Brussels was addressed again with this action. Overcoming the impasse in the conservation of listed buildings in Brussels seemed to be very difficult...

25. THE “LIVRES BLANCS POUR LA RÉAFFECTATION DU PATRIMOINE ARCHITECTURAL” In 1983, following a campaign around the slogan “Don’t chuck, it, reuse it!”, and on the initiative of Jean-Pierre Poupko, the French-language culture committee of the Greater Brussels Authority established a working party consisting of representatives of different bodies to pro-actively develop proposals for the preservation of Brussels’ architectural heritage. Rather than rely on listing, the group was asked to come up with ideas for the rehabilitation of old buildings. To prevent their being abandoned, the group was to investigate new uses, encouraging the public authorities, private owners and property professionals to make use of old buildings rather than build new ones. This initiative led to the publication, between 1983 and 1988, of the four Livres blancs de la Campagne et de l’Action pour la Réaffectation du Patrimoine architectural [White Papers on the Re-Use of the Architectural Heritage], compilations of proposals for reconversion. The preservation of the RTBF building on Place Flagey was one of the more significant results of these. Since 1986, the Compagnie des Bronzes site has been occupied by La Fonderie, another successful proposal from the white papers: a museum that looks at the industrial history of Brussels and its social and urbanistic effects and sustains debate on contemporary urban issues through exhibitions, publications and tours.

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Sint-Maria/Sainte Marie church in Schaarbeek/Schaerbeek, one of the first and most remarkable buildings in the eclectic style, designed in 1851 by the architect Henri-Désiré-Louis Van Overstraeten, was already closed in 1966, allegedly due to the risk of collapse. The ministers at the time decided not to protect the church with a listed building status. From then on began the ordeal. The first restoration works only started in 1982. On 9 August 1985, a fire destroyed part of the dome. The restoration works were halted and only resumed in 1992. In the meantime, the interior of the church was largely destroyed and for countless years, it was a haven for pigeons and vermin. As the capital of Art Nouveau, Brussels neglected this unique image for many decades. The wrecking ball made great inroads in the works of Paul Hankar. Victor Horta’s main buildings were demolished, others were only just saved. The works of the second generation of Art Nouveau architects were knocked about just as much, some buildings were even mutilated on purpose by building developers, like the town houses by architect Jules Brunfaut on Ijzerlaan/Avenue de l’Yser. Industrial archaeology monuments were hardly valued. The shot tower, for example, was threatened with demolition in 1980. This was the only surviving witness of the manufacture of lead shot in Western Europe. 36 years later in 2016, there is finally a project for its restoration and conversion.

27. FORUM LOUIZA, ALIAS WILTCHER’S – 1988 Archives d’Architecture Moderne (Modern Architecture Archives), the Association des commerçants de la Galerie Louise (Louise Gallery shopkeepers association), the Atelier de Recherche et d’Action Urbaines (Urban Research and Action Workshop), the Centre Bruxellois d’Archéologie Contemporaine – La Pioche d’Or (Brussels Contemporary Architecture Centre – The Golden Pickaxe), the Comité de défense de Saint-Gilles (Saint-Gilles Defence Committee), the Comité Lesbroussart (Lesbroussart Committee), the Fondation pour l’Architecture (Architecture Foundation), Interenvironnement Bruxelles (Inter-environment Brussels), Sauvegarde du Quartier Louise (Louise Neighbourhood Conservation) and the Sint-Lukasarchief (Sint Lukas archive) carried out an international campaign together: Louizalaan/ Avenue Louise threatened – keep these town houses – Save our heritage. Eleven unique town houses on Louizalaan/Avenue Louise 75 to 83 and Charleroisesteenweg/Chaussée de Charleroi 10 to 20 were threatened with demolition to make way for the so-called ‘prestigious

multifunctional investment project Forum Louiza’ by the contractors : the insurance group AG., U.C.B., C.I.B. and Herpain. The town houses on Louizalaan/Avenue Louise and their beautiful interiors were designed by the most prominent Brussels architects : Paul Saintenoy, Hendrik Beyaert, Emile Janlet and Henri Maquet. The protection procedure was initiated in 1982, but since then no further action had been taken by the authorities... The architect André Jacqmain suggested that rather than completely demolishing the town houses, the façades could be rebuilt on undeveloped land on Engelandstraat/Rue d’Angleterre in Sint-Gillis/Saint-Gilles. The façade of the beautiful Art Nouveau building by Paul Saintenoy would be rebuilt a few metres further along. Façadism on a huge scale ! Of the two symmetrical corner buildings designed by the architect Henri Maquet, the one on the left was already demolished in 1985. The building on the right would go the same way, to make way for the construction of two symmetrical ‘perfume bottles’ by Ateliers de Genval. The action committees couldn’t drag everything out of the fire, but the building developers and architects were restricted by the assembled action committees.

IV. ABOUT SEVEN KEY PROJECTS

26. ABOUT SEVERAL RESCUE CAMPAIGNS BEFORE AND AFTER 1989

IV. ABOUT SIX PROJECTS The information shown in the timeline about Sint-Lukasarchief is explained here with a focus on activities in Brussels in the pioneering days. Great progress was made with a small team at the beginning in 1968 with architect Alfons Hoppenbrouwers (1930-2001), initiator, and Jos Vandenbreeden, architect, the first ‘pioneer’, from 1973, Jan Apers, also an architect and the ‘second pioneer’ and from 1979, the art historians Linda Van Santvoort and Oda Goossens and photographer Paul De Prins. In Belgium and thus in Brussels too, at that time we were confronted with brutal urban interventions and incompetent transformations of the environment and living space. The establishment, architectural organisations, architects, project developers and their designers put their heads in the sand, but didn’t always succeed. Some projects continued over longer periods. All in all, the frequent efforts, the results from applied research, exhibitions, actions and awareness-raising campaigns made effective contributions, on the one hand to the city debate and on the other to a change of mentality in the field of urban planning and architectural heritage and for the reuse

1. Brussels 1550 – 1992: fundamental study with consequences for the further urban development of Brussels, founded on a historical basis. 2. The Urgentie-Inventaris (Urgency Inventory) 1975 – 2017 still gives the most complete overview of the heritage and the value scales and criteria set at that time. 3. Charle-Albert castle: 1978 – 2016: now a shadow of its former glory, or how iconographic preservation and archiving movable heritage can also be useful. 4. The famous Rogier tower 1957 – 2001/2002, or how the most interesting example of a high-rise building – a multifunctional city in the city – was razed to the ground by pure speculation.

IV. ABOUT SEVEN KEY PROJECTS

5. The Omroepgebouw/Maison de la Radio – Flagey 1985 – 2002: proof that it can be done. 6. Victor Horta, Henry Van de Velde, Antonio Gaudi, Hector Guimard, Josef Hoffmann, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the Art Nouveau diaspora all over the world … also from Brussels!

PHILIPPE CHRISTIAN POPP VAN SCHAALWIJK [1805-1879] AND THE CADASTRAL ATLAS

IV. ABOUT SEVEN KEY PROJECTS

and revitalisation of buildings and sites... extended to the visual and material quality of our living space, known as our ‘environment’ in the pioneering years. It was always about a shared approach: never about pure historic preservation, but about prior research, about raising awareness, sometimes in a fun way, combined with city activism and projections for the future. Many urban development and architectural treasures were thus saved and supported in their transition to reconversion, so there was no lack of ideological position taking. At the same time, together with the research, exhibitions and publications, archives were also collected which would otherwise have got hopelessly lost. Starting out from the real situation each time, including the scars in the city often caused by building developers and their architects, bit by bit the city took shape, both in a material and a theoretical way. For every ‘destruction project’ there was a realistic alternative... and even today, too much is still demolished! Just take Fortis bank on Avenue Ravenstein/ Ravensteinstraat and the unseemly restyling and/or demolition of the typical high-rise architecture of the fifties and sixties, as if a tabula rasa could be made of an entire fascinating period in architecture. If we start out from an absolute ideal, we can never hang an unrealistic vision of the future on it. The projects provided real tools to think and act differently: concrete contributions lead to the preservation and redevelopment of urban planning and architectural heritage in particular and to the promotion of image quality in modern life in general. Reintegrating, renovating, redeveloping (recycling) and restoring the heritage in context and (re)integrating it into modern life was the driving force. Because some projects take place over the long-term before they experience a new life... mutilated or demolished before anyone had time to think of restoration or revitalisation, there is also a ‘1989 and after’. The seven projects picked are thus just a small selection from almost fifty years of activities:

In 1838, P.C. Popp devised a project of gigantic proportions: creating and distributing lasting cadastral plans of the whole of Belgium in lithograph form, including the records and land registries. Without any form of subsidies, he continued his cadastral atlas project from 1842 until his death in 1879. Each cadastral plan, made with the utmost care in lithograph form, is represented on a 1:1250, 1:2500 or 1:5000 scale, depending on the size of the territory. It is complemented by the land registry on which the numbers of the parcel are indicated, as well as the surnames, first names and place of residence of the owners, etc. The maps contain all the built-up and undeveloped parcels with their exact boundaries. Jos Hogenes used the 1866 cadastral plan of the City of Brussels on a 1:1250 scale to draw up his cartographic study of the evolution of the Brussels pentagon between 1550 and 1992.

BRUSSELS 1550 – 1992 It’s not a common occurrence that the Amsterdam urban planner Jos Hogenes only engaged in a historical study about the changes in the Brussels street grid out of personal interest. Jos Hogenes spent years, parcel by parcel, detecting, analysing, comparing, fitting together and redrawing all the usable city maps and checking on the spot the modern network of streets in the Brussels pentagon. The original and surprising thing about his working method is the quantity of information about the growth and changes of a city which, only by very patient superposition of graphic map material, he was able to convey in visual form, down to the details. After all, over the past two centuries in Brussels, hardly any streets and squares have not been widened, extended, criss-crossed, updated or cleared away. The 1640 – 1980 map series was first displayed in 1982 during the exhibition Straten en Stenen, Brussel: Stadsgroei 1780 – 1980 (Streets and Stones, Brussels: Urban growth 1780 - 1980).

IV. ABOUT SEVEN KEY PROJECTS

REFERENCE MAPS : • 1550 “Atlas des villes des Pays-Bas” (Atlas of the Cities of the Netherlands), Brussels, Jacob van Deventer • 1640 “Bruxella, Nobilissima Brabantiae Civitas”, Martin de Tailly (1748 reissue) • 1777 “Plan Topographique de la ville de Bruxelles et de ses environs” (Topographic Plan of the City of Brussels and its surroundings), Joseph de Ferraris • 1835 “Plan Géométrique de la Ville de Bruxelles” (Geometric Plan of the City of Brussels) Willem-Benjamin Craan • 1866 “Plan Parcellaire de la ville de Bruxelles” (Plot map of the City of Brussels) Philippe Christian Popp • 1894 “Bruxelles & ses environs” (Brussels and its Surroundings) Institut Cartographique Militaire (Military Cartographic Institute) • 1931 SABENA aerial photo • 1980 Maps from the Public Works Technical Service, City of Brussels, City Planning Study and basic documents, 1550 – 1980 map series : Jos Hogenes, urban planner, Amsterdam Combined summary map 1640 – 1980 : Sint-Lukasarchief VZW, Herwig Delvaux.

THE URGENTIE-INVENTARIS [URGENCY INVENTORY] SINT-LUKASARCHIEF, Apers, Jan, Hoppenbrouwers Alfons, Vandenbreeden Jos, Bouwen door de eeuwen heen, Brussel-Hoofdstad, Urgentie-inventaris van het Bouwkundig Erfgoed van de Brusselse Agglomeratie (Building through the centuries, Brussels Capital, Urgency Inventory of the Architectural Heritage of the Brussels Urban Area). Gent, Snoeck-Ducaju en Zoon, 1979.

On the eve of the European Year of Architectural heritage, 1975, the Nederlandse Commissie voor de Cultuur van de Brussels Agglomeratie (Dutch-speaking Commission for Culture of the Brussels Urban Area, now the Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie or Flemish Community Commission) gave the Sint-Lukasarchief the task of working on a systematic inventory of all the architectural heritage in the Brussels urban area of the time. In this pre-computer age, Jos Vandenbreeden, Alfons Hoppen brouwers and Jan Apers worked on this titanic baseline study for over four years. One municipality at a time, street after street, first the even, then the odd side, building after building, façade after façade, Alfons Hoppenbrouwers and Jos Vandenbreeden covered the entire urban area of Brussels, a good 160 km2, on foot, armed with a camera and notebooks. The Brussels road network is 1,628 kilometres long. Each street was examined and photographed on both sides, which also involved a hike of around 3,200 kilometres, a little less than a pilgrimage from Brussels to Santiago de Compostela and back. We photographed and noted everything that stood out from the ordinary and everyday, either as a whole or in the details. When the first round was complete, we had about 1,100 rolls of 135 film, with 40,740 photos. All these photos were developed by us, printed and stuck to index cards, arranged in a double system, geographically, by municipality and by street and by name of the designer : around 81,400 items. This system can still be consulted today and due to the numerous demolitions is becoming more and more of a historical document. Using the set criteria, value numbers were allocated to all separate buildings and to entire buildings : 1: unique, 2: very memorable, 3: memorable, 4: valuable, 5: incidentally valuable (accompanying another building). In total for the publication of the Urgency Inventory in 1979, of the tens of thousands of photographic images, 9,022 separate buildings were selected, with some forming part of whole buildings, walls on streets and on squares. After all, an important option was not to approach heritage as a whole of isolated objects, but to situate it in context. Our hope at the time that the inventory would become a tool in a dynamic prospective heritage policy, to be integrated into an architectural policy, was only partly fulfilled. The Urgency Inventory was never confirmed in legislation, so its influence has been repeatedly affected by policy. But the Urgency Inventory was avidly used as an interesting working tool by the various city councils, urban planning services, at consultation committees, by action committees, by heritage managers... and yes, even by property developers, project developers... and the fire brigade.

V. ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS

The seven reference maps from Hogenes’ study dating from 1640 to 1980 were laid on top of each other in 1986. This allowed us to work out the evolution of each street and each square. Wherever we are in Brussels, the colour code allows us to read off the architectural development of that location over the last 340 years. This series of maps is not only a valuable historical and tourism document, it also forms a scientific basis on which urban planning and architectural developments in the inner city can be substantiated and brought into policy in order to make informed decisions and prevent urban planning mistakes or blunders in the future.

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JOHN RUSKIN “The principle of modern times, is to neglect buildings first, and restore them afterwards. Take proper care of your monuments, and you will not need to restore them. A few sheets of lead put in time upon a roof, a few dead leaves and sticks swept in time out of a water-course, will save both roof and walls from ruin. Watch an old building with an anxious care; guard it as best you may, and at any cost, from every influence of dilapidation. Count its stones as you would jewels of a crown; set watches about it as if at the gates of a besieged city; bind it together with iron where it loosens ; stay it with timber where it declines ; do not care about the unsightliness of the aid : better a crutch than a lost limb ; and do this tenderly, and reverently, and continually, and many a generation will still be born and pass away beneath its shadow.” John Ruskin, The Lamp of Memory, in The Seven Lamps of Architecture, London, 1849.

CHARLE ALBERT CASTLE “THE FLAMISH HOUSE” 1869-2016 “I built the Flemish house, some think badly, others think well, how harmful are words, whether they be sour or sweet... because someone else does better”

Charle-Albert, text incorporated into the scrollwork cartouches on the castle’s façade.

The castle, designed and built by and for the architect Charle Albert between 1869 and 1887, was one of the earliest examples and also the crowning work of the neo-Flemish renaissance in Brussels, thanks to its exterior but also its interior design. The architectonic and landscape qualities of the grounds, the various façades and their constituent parts, from the precious antique interior parts and the interior elements interpreted by Charle Albert in neo-Flemish renaissance style make it an inseparable and unique historic whole. Charles Albert castle is listed under code 2, very memorable, in the Urgentie-Inventaris (Urgency Inventory). The Sint-Lukasarchief, which had already submitted a protection file for this building on 11 October 1978, made a last call in 1983 to all policy bodies involved to reactivate the deadlocked protection procedure. It would take until 8 August 1988 for the castle to be protected as a listed building. Even after it was protected, the building’s decline visibly continued under the ‘watchful eye’ of the government and the Koninklijke Commissie voor Monumenten en Landschappen (Royal Commission for Monuments and Landscapes). From an almost intact interior in 1978, the château and its interior deteriorated into a miserable ruin over a period of 35 years. In 2012 the ‘restoration works’ are ‘reconstruction works’ and the renovation started in 2014 was completed under the direction of the architectural practice MA2 Metzger et Associés Architecture. But ‘...how harmful are words, whether they be sour or sweet, because someone else does better’?

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In March 1994, an update to the 1979 inventory was presented to the Secretary of State Didier van Eyll, also the commissioning party, which in total contained 16,197 separate buildings, not including the heritage of the Brussels pentagon. However, this revised inventory never saw the light of day as a publication, because in the meantime, as of 1979, work had restarted on drawing up the regional inventory of architectural heritage, which is still not complete today, after 38 years.

JOHN RUSKIN “Neither by the public, nor by those who have the care of public monuments, is the true meaning of the word restoration understood. It is the means the most total destruction which a building worst manner can suffer : a destruction out of which no remnants can be gathered : a destruction accompanied with false description of the thing destroyed. Do not let us deceive ourselves in this important matter; it is impossible, as impossible as to raise the dead, to restore anything that has ever been great or beautiful in architecture.” John Ruskin, The Lamp of Memory, in The Seven Lamps of Architecture, London, 1849.

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The Sint Lukas archive has created various exhibitions and publications on Horta and Art Nouveau, the most recent of which, ‘Art Nouveau diaspora’, dealt with the spread of Art Nouveau around the world. This exhibition was held in the Cauchie House, the Oslo School of Architecture and Design and in the Jugendstil Center in Alesund, Norway. The fictitious ice-blue map is roughly based on the mappa mundi drawn in 1459 by the monk Fra Mauro (b. ±1460), who lived in the Venetian monastery of San Michele. In his youth Fra Mauro travelled widely as a trader and soldier, and when he entered his religious order he developed his skills to become a renowned mapmaker. Fra Mauro was the first cartographer to systematically draw on information from the travel chronicles of Marco Polo (1254-1324), entitled Il Milione, to create a world map. The poetic world map of Art Nouveau includes a few large islands with capital cities such as Horta, Guimard, Gaudi, Van de Velde, Mackintosh, Wagner and Hoffmann. These are surrounded by lowlands with less familiar movements and the names of the architects who helped spread Art Nouveau around the world, along with their various interconnections. Around the edges are the warships of Le Corbusier, who wiped the 19th century world and Art Nouveau from the map after the First World War. Starting in 1893, Brussels and the pioneers of Art Nouveau – Victor Horta, Henry Van de Velde and Paul Hankar – set the tone for modern architecture in Europe. Together with Antonio Gaudi in Catalonia, Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Glasgow, Otto Wagner and Josef Hoffmann, these architects sent the new architecture around the world. Across Europe, from Paris through Vienna to Moscow and as far as Buenos Aires, a fresh breeze of architecture encircled the globe.

SAVE THE RADIO BUILDING Without the intervention of the Sint-Lukasarchief, the Maison de la Radio – now the Flagey cultural centre – would likely no longer exist. Although Joseph Diongre called on the most modern technologies of the time in designing this building for the Belgian radio service in 1933, it would remain in use for only 35 years. On 10 September 1997, following its nomination by the SintLukasarchief, an international jury selected the Maison de la Radio for inclusion on the “World Monuments Watch 1998-1999” list of 100 endangered sites worthy of conservation (www.wmf.org).

THE RADIO BUILDING SAVED Samyn and Partners were commissioned to manage the renovation and conversion, notably the refitting as a concert hall of Studio 4, the architectural highlight of the building and an acoustic masterpiece. The Maison de la Radio reopened as the Flagey cultural centre on 30 September 2002.

THE INTERNATIONAAL ROGIERCENTRUM/ CENTRE INTERNATIONAL ROGIER BRUSSELS

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ART NOUVEAU DIASPORA

MARTINI TOWER – ‘A RENDEZ-VOUS WITH THE WORLD’ – CLEAR FIFTIES ICON – INTERNATIONAL MEETING PLACE FOR EXPO 58 – THE FIRST MULTIFUNCTIONAL SKYSCRAPER IN EUROPE – VERTICAL COMPACT CITY IN THE CITY – BRUSSELS LANDMARK N.V. LOTIMO, Mr A.W. Smets and Mrs M. Smets-Hennekinne, contractors. Jacques Cuisinier, Serge Lebrun, architects and engineer J. Mauquoy – André Jacqmain and Jules Wabbes, architects of the Théâtre National. 116 luxury apartments, Hera, Iris and Pallas models – The Martini Centre, the heart of the entertainment world – Théatre National, 2 theatres with foyer, 4 bars, artists’ foyer, 13 boxes for 38 artists, director’s office, archives, painting studio, set storeroom, 13,816 m2 culture – bank branch – polyclinic – chemist – petrol station – restaurants – administrative services – 85 shops, shopping gallery – business centre: 25,000 m2 offices – bus station, public transport hub – car park for 1,000 cars – international conference complex – over 5,000 people in the building each day. 117 metres high – 30 floors – 20,000 m3 reinforced concrete – 1,165 Franki piles – 40 Preflex beams – 360 Non-flex beams – 58,000 m2 walls – 207,500 m2 plasterwork – 77,800 m2 screed – 103,000 m2 insulation material – 12,800 m2 flooring – 11,300 m2 faience – 3,200 interior doors – 25,000 m2 aluminium windows – 24,600 m2 double glazing – 10,000 m pipes – 10,000 m cables – 36,500 m2 rubber – 10,000 m2 parquet flooring... 19 September 1957: first brick laid – 31 March 1958: first shop opened – 14 April 1958: inauguration of the bus station – 4 October 1958: construction of the international conference complex began – 6 October 1958: first exhibition ‘Urbanisation et renaissance d’un quartier’ (Urbanisation and the rebirth of a neighbourhood) – 9 January 1959: inauguration of the international conference complex with the General Motors car show – 15 February 1959: construction of the 9th floor complete – 23 June 1960: minister Omer Vanaudenhove performs the topping-out ceremony

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DEMOLISHED IN 2001-2002.

V. ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS As their name suggests, counter-projects are projects conceived in opposition to other projects, which might be public or private initiatives. The idea of the counter-project was developed at the La Cambre architecture school in the early 1970s, under the aegis of Maurice Culot, at a time when Brussels and other Belgian cities were faced by brutal urban transformations in which their inhabitants had no say. Architects, engineers, government functionaries and politicians thought the city theirs to do what they liked with, with no need to consult, their urban thinking based on knocking it down and starting again with everything organised around the motor car. These years saw a proliferation of protest, with local residents coming together in neighbourhood committees. The idea of the counter-project was to show that for every project tending to destroy the city there was a realistic alternative. The choice of counter-projects to be worked on at La Cambre was determined by the current situation, either responding to a request from the Atelier de Recherche et d’Action Urbaines (ARAU) or from a residents’ committee, or examining future possibilities By 1979, when Maurice Culot and his team were forced out of La Cambre almost a decade later, students there had produced nearly a hundred counter-projects. This production can be divided into two periods. The first period tended more toward the ludic, finding inspiration in the work of the Archigram group around Peter Cook, reflecting the enthusiasm of the time for British music, fashion and architecture.

The second, more political period, is associated with two people in particular: the sociologist René Schoonbrodt, president of the ARAU, who brought a more socially-aware and activist approach, and Léon Krier, a Luxemburgish architect living in London, who made an important theoretical contribution in defining the constitutive features of the European city: the neighbourhood, the square and the street.

1. LUDIC COUNTER-PROJECTS 1970-1975 To understand what this was all about you have to go back to the years when Brussels was being devastated with the complicity of the architectural establishment and amid the deafening silence of the professional associations. The first counter-projects are mocking and ironic in character, reflecting a romantic leftism inspired by May ’68 and nourished by the counter-culture, the hippy movement and communitarian thinking. The idea was to throw off the moralising and constraining ethos of a school that took itself for something special – the possessor of a unique spirit, the never explicitly articulated legacy of the Van de Velde years. The project for an inflatable red fist at the foot of the tower on the Square du Bastion is typical of the provocative and carefree approach of those years, which echoes the anarchistic humour of such magazines as Charlie Mensuel and Hara-Kiri. As the counter-projects required a knowledge of history if they were to properly find their place in the city, the students undertaking them had to educate themselves. The development of a counter-project for a site that had earlier housed a panorama thus led to research on panoramas that would issue in a publication. Iconoclastic is not too strong a word to describe the project of Elie Levy, son of Moïse Levy, chief rabbi of the Congo, who proposed to clad one of the studios at the school with fabric hangings in red and black reminiscent of Nazi banners. And it is true that Van de Velde and some of the La Cambre teachers were accused of collaboration after the war, on account of their involvement in the Commissariat Général à la Restauration du Pays – the commission responsible for reconstruction in occupied Belgium. The bridge in the form of a reclining naked woman that Philippe Lefèvre (assisted by Philippe De Gobert) proposed to build across Graystraat/Rue Gray is a way of marking a breach with the functionalist dogma that dominated the architectural education offered at La Cambre. The first counter-projects mark the beginning of a detachment from architecture as institution. Architects could now be mocked, criticized in the press, and challenged by students.

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for the completion of the works on the Internationaal Rogiercentrum/ Centre International Rogier. March 1996 – the last resident Roger Faniel was evicted from his apartment – 2001: the Brussels Government and the Secretary of State for Monuments and Landscapes Willem Draps refused to register the Internationaal Rogiercentrum/Centre International Rogier on the safeguarding list for architectural heritage after 619 people officially requested it, in accordance with Article 7, paragraph 2 of the ordinance of 4 March 1993 on the preservation of immovable heritage in the Brussels Capital Region.

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1.2. SIX PROPOSALS FOR THE SQUARE DU BASTION – 1974-75 In the 1960s a 28-storey tower was built on the Bastionplein/Square du Bastion, by the Naamsepoort/Porte de Namur at the northern end of the Elsenesteenweg/Chaussée d’Ixelles. With this tall building on its flank, the square is exceptionally windy, with fierce gusts often making movement on foot difficult. The students’ terms of reference were as follows: “in a supersaturated commercial environment, to implant a visually strong object; to appeal to curiosity, to wonder, to doubt; to give the immediate neighbourhood of the Naamsepoort/Porte de Namur a distinctive identity, by means of a simple sign; and to leave this open to interpretation and imagination.” Playful in spirit and much inspired by the British counter-culture of the day, the six counter-projects by La Cambre architecture students proposed the creation of a covered space accommodating retail and cultural facilities. Ranging from a gigantic red raised fist to a reconstruction of historic Brussels, each project is marked by a strong identity.

1.3. PROPOSAL FOR A NURSERY IN LES MAROLLES – 1972-1973 Set in the Marolles neighbourhood that lies alongside the Law Courts, this exercise asked students to design a nursery while taking into account a number of technical and urban constraints, among them a tiny site, a heterogeneous context, and the need to include an antenatal clinic and a youth club. The nursery marks its place at the entrance to the working class neighbourhood of Les Marolles with a large fresco representing the street in “trompe-l’œil”. Frequently used in the past, but rejected by modernist architects, “trompe-l’œil” would often be used in the counter-projects developed at La Cambre to alleviate the ugliness of certain views. Today, the trompe-l’oeil murals of Brussels are a tourist attraction, even if not all are well judged.

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1.1. THE VENICE BIENNALE – 1980 The first Venice Architecture Biennale was held in 1980, its theme being “The Presence of the Past”. Housed in the Corderie of the Arsenale, it was curated by Paolo Portoghesi, an architect by training who taught history of architecture at the universities of Rome and Milan and theorist of Italian postmodernism. The Corderie, the narrow, 316-metre long building where rope was made for the Venetian navy, allowed him to adopt a layout that made history with his Strada Novissima, a “street” with a succession of facades each by a different architect, among them Bofill, Gehry, Graves, Koolhaas, Krier, de Portzamparc and Venturi. The AAM for its part presented a selection of counter-projects in the space behind the façade designed by Léon Krier. Extracted from the introduction to the exhibition catalogue: “The return of architecture to the womb of history and its recycling in new syntactic contexts of traditional forms is one of the characteristics that has produced a profound ‘difference’ in a series of works and projects in the past few years, understood by some critics to be in the ambiguous but efficacious category of Postmodernism.” “The aim [of the Strada Novissima] was to enable the visitors to verify directly ‘the return to the street’ as a formative element of the city and one of the fundamental aims of Post-Modern research.”

1.4. EVERYTHING YOU CAN DO WITH A VACANT LOT – 1975 The “Greetings from Brussels” column in architectural magazine A+ regularly denounced the deplorable state of urban planning in Brussels in the form of an open letter to a minister or local politician. In June 1975, it tackled the mayor of Sint-Josse-ten-Noode/Saint-Josse-ten-Noode on the subject of a piece of waste ground lying between the Rue George Petrestraat and the Tweetorenstraat/Rue des Deux Tours, without however proposing any solution. Finding the column too unconstructive, the students came up with a series of alternatives to bring the vacant lot back to life. Presented to both the residents’ committee and the local authority, their study offers a humorous response to the problem, opening up lines of thought for the revision of a 1972 development plan that had not been implemented for financial reasons 1.5. PROPOSALS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MAELBEEK VALLEY – 1971-1973 The Graystraat/Rue Gray connects Flagey plein/Place Flagey to Jourdan plein/Place Jourdan following the valley of the Maelbeek, the “Mill Brook” that now runs underground. Intending to improve traffic conditions and at the same time rebuild the sewer that carried the stream, the national highways authority proposed to widen the road, knocking down much of this old-established working class neighbourhood. The La Cambre students sought to show that the widening, which would involve much compulsory purchase, was too costly in both

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1.6. NEXT DOOR TO DE KONINCK – 1977 At the corner of the Kluistraat/Rue de l’Ermitage and the De Hennin straat/Rue de Hennin is an unbuilt plot. The La Cambre students were asked to design an apartment building for this, giving particular attention to its relationship to the existing architecture, i.e. the middle-class single-family dwellings in the De Hennin straat/Rue de Hennin and the apartment building in the International Style by L.H. De Koninck in the Kluistraat/Rue de l’Ermitage. Condemned by modernist architects for not allowing a garden, the corner building had until then been excluded from the work of La Cambre students. Reacting against this functionalist conception, the project sought to prompt fresh thinking about its possibilities. 1.7. TENT FOR A TRAVELING EXHIBITION ON THE THEME OF THE CITY – 1972 The Caisse Générale d’Epargne et de Retraite savings bank asked the AAM to design an exhibition on the urban environment. This was to be staged in the Regentschapstraat/Rue de la Régence in Brussels and in four other towns, and was thus to be accommodated in a tent. Architect Fernand Joachim and painter Paul De Gobert proposed a long tent housing large screens on which would be projected slideshows evoking urban environments accompanied by “commentary featuring different political, urbanistic and aesthetic points of view, complementary or contradictory”. Other activities could also be held in the tent, such as plays, seminars and more. The project was eventually abandoned by the CGER for being too controversial at a time when tensions between the public authorities and local residents ran high.

2. ACTIVIST COUNTER-PROJECTS 1975-79 Three things would change the situation, and turn the counter-projects to more directly political ends: the success of the ARAU and the proliferation of residents’ committees, which led to a great demand for images for use in campaigns against proposed private or public developments; the encounter with Léon Krier, who offered a method of composition based on the analysis of traditional cities; and the arrival at La Cambre of a generation of motivated and ambitious students.

From now on, realism would have the upper hand against poetry, and counter-projects would be treated as practical proposals. In order to avoid discussions of architectural style and to make progress despite the shifting sands of aesthetic debate, the architecture of the counter-projects was essentially contextually inspired, immediately recognisable to local residents. Intended for publication in daily newspapers, the graphics adopted the ligne claire (clear line) style associated with Hergé and with Belgian comics more generally, black line on a white ground. To ensure maximum legibility, counter-projects were presented in perspective drawings and above all in axonometric projections that offered an overview of the whole. The influence of Léon Krier, who argued for a return to architecture as craft, would give rise to the idea of an “anti-industrial resistance” that found expression in performances in costume, with music, reconnecting with a tradition from the early years of the school. As La Cambre provided campaigns with ever more accomplished counter-projects, the architectural establishment felt itself under direct challenge, as these alternative proposals gained the support of residents, so threatening its interests. Certain counter-projects proved to be the final straw, notably those opposing the extension of the Banque de Bruxelles in De Zavel/Le Sablon and the demolition of Hofberg/Rue Montagne de-la Cour to build the entrance block for the museum of modern art. In 1979, teachers René Schoonbrodt, Kris van de Giessen and Annick Brauman, together with Maurice Culot and nearly all his assistants were dismissed by the ministry responsible for the school. Most of the students of this generation at La Cambre would go on to develop architectural practices sought after for their ability to come up with projects that engaged with urban narratives and avoided raising local residents’ hackles.

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financial and social terms. “The proposals should be read ironically: a reductio ad absurdum intended to show people that the most attractive of architectural visualisations guarantee local residents nothing at all if the economic and social aspects are left out of account.”

2.1 PROPOSAL FOR THE RECONSTRUCTION IN BRUSSELS OF THE BATTLE OF THE YSER PANORAMA – 1977 Popular spectacles representing historic battles or views of interest, the panoramas that emerged in the 19th century attracted enthusiastic crowds. In 1920, a building on what is now the Lemonnierlaan/Boulevard Lemonnier housed a panorama of the Battle of the Yser (1914). This was transferred to Ostend some years later and the building turned into a multi-storey car park. Intended for the block adjoining the Fontainas plaats/Place Fontainas, this counter-project proposes to recreate the panorama on the translucent wall of a circular gallery set into a complex housing offices, hotel accommodation and leisure facilities, the whole giving onto a park that crosses the block from one side to the other.

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2.2 WHEN THE ARMY LEAVES… – 1974-1978 Brussels’ barracks were abandoned by the military following “technological developments in warfare”. In 1976, the sites thus made available were allocated to the construction of social housing. The barracks were particularly well located in the city centre, close to all urban facilities. The Archives d’Architecture Moderne were asked to study the possibilities for developing the different sites. The proposals for each site were all governed by the same general principles. While traditionally social housing had taken the form of standardised blocks laid out without regard to the existing urban fabric, here great attention was paid to integration as well as to architectural and functional differentiation, to create lively, mixed-use ensembles. The pedestrian axes determined the siting of buildings and of public spaces such as squares and parks while ensuring connections to the rest of the neighbourhood. Some of the barracks buildings would be retained and refurbished. 2.3 KUNSTWIJK/QUARTIER DES ARTS – 1978 Set between the Koningklijk paleis/Palais Royal and the Egmontpaleis/ Palais d’Egmont, the Kunstwijk/Quartier des Arts has the Naamsestraat/ Rue de Namur as its chief thoroughfare. With the Regentschapstraat/ Rue de la Régence on one side and the Inner Ring Road on the other, this neighbourhood mostly of offices and public buildings is cut off and lacking in life. The counter-project seeks a diversification of function, proposing a new layout that reorganises the whole neighbourhood around a wide new pedestrian street (3) linking the Koningklijk paleis/Palais Royal to the Grenadier Barracks, much of whose site is given over to two public squares (4 and 5) and a substantial provision of public housing. The Kernstraat/Rue du Pépin and the Ruysbroeckstraat/Rue de Ruysbroeck would be linked by a square ascending in steps (7). At the other end of the new street, monumental porticos flank its meeting with a new Place du Palais Royal (2) intended to integrate the Palais Royal into the urban fabric and serve as a junction for pedestrian routes. The new streets and squares restore a traditional urban layout and open up the neighbourhood to the rest of the city. 2.4 THE NOORDWIJK/QUARTIER NORD (NORTHERN QUARTER)– 1976-1978 Lying between Brussels North station and the Antwerpesteenweg/ Chaussée d’Anvers, the Northern quarter had attracted the interest of architects since the early 20th century, one being Victor Bourgeois who

in 1928 proposed a development of parallel slabs along functionalist lines, dubbed “the New Brussels”. Brussels businessmen, among them the developer Charly De Pauw, who won the support of the city authorities, hoped to make Brussels an international business centre. They took up Victor Bourgeois’s idea again, proposing a “Manhattan plan” designed by Groupe Structures. The highlight of the project was a “World Trade Centre”, eight 100-metrehigh office towers set at the intersection of two motorways. Against this functionalist project and the massive compulsory purchase programme it entailed, the ARAU and AAM proposed a mixed-use neighbourhood integrating the Brussels North station and melding with the neighbourhoods alongside. Some of the counter-projects would also provide for a large public park. 2.5 OUD KORENHUISPLEIN/PLACE DE LA VIEILLE HALLE AUX BLÉS – 1972-1973 The City of Brussels wished to take advantage of the demolitions associated with work on the North-South Connection to renew the city centre, clearing slums to build towers and slabs of offices and housing. In 1964 it adopted a development plan for the Oud Korenhuisplein/Place de la Vieille Halle aux Blés that provided for the construction of four towers. Only one was ever built, which for a long time housed the planning department of the province of Brabant. Opposing this functionalist vision, the ARAU demanded that the plans be abandoned, presenting proposals for the rebuilding of the square that respected the existing urban fabric, the alignment of the buildings and the historic architecture of the site. The City eventually changed its tune, revising the original plans in line with many of the proposals embodied in the counter-project presented by the AAM and the ARAU. 2.6 NORTH-SOUTH CONNECTION – 1976-1978 Brussels’ North and South railway stations were originally designed as termini, like those of Paris. Proposals to connect the two were first made in the second half of the 19th century. Work on the North South Connection was begun in 1911 and completed only in the 1950s. The cutand-cover construction of the two-kilometre railway link made a gash through central Brussels and the demolitions it involved created a caesura between the Upper and Lower Towns. By the early 1970s, despite many schemes being proposed, the scar had still not healed and the La Cambre students came up with an overall development plan for the area between Brussels South station and the Botanical Gardens. The city was here to be reconstituted on

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2.7 RECONSTRUCTION OF THE FACADE OF THE HÔTEL AUBECQ – 1979 An Art Nouveau masterpiece built by Victor Horta in 1900, the Hôtel Aubecq at 520 Louisalaan/Avenue Louise was demolished in 1949 to be replaced by an apartment building. Jean Delhaye, a pupil of Horta’s and a great champion of his work, asked his friend Maurice Culot to study the re-erection of the façade of the building, which he had succeeded in saving. Different possible sites were examined by a group of La Cambre architecture students, the Hofberg/Rue Montagne de la Cour finally emerging as the best suited, notably allowing the incorporation of the Salle Cousin, another important creation of Horta’s, dismantled and conserved at the Musée d’Art Ancien. The reconstruction of the facade would close off the Museumplein/ Place du Musée, recreating the little Museumstraat/Rue du Musée. The premises behind would serve the needs of tourists, and when lit up at night the Art Nouveau façade would serve as a pendant to the former Old England department store that now houses the musical instrument museum. 2.8 THE KRUIDENTUINWIJK/QUARTIER BOTANIQUE 1977-1979 From 1977 onward, the Régie pour l’Aménagement – the Development Corporation – would be the chief instrument of the policy of renewal of the existing building stock adopted by the Greater Brussels authorities. Its goal was the expansion of housing, which had suffered from property developers’ preference for office-building. Two pilot projects were launched: one for the renovation of part of the Wolstraat/Rue aux Laines, while preserving its distinctive features and architectural history, the other for the renovation of the Kruidentuinwijk /Quartier Botanique. In this working-class neighbourhood named for the nearby Botanical Gardens, a property developer’s plans to turn housing into offices had attracted the opposition of a neighbourhood committee, whose fiveyear campaign led to the adoption of a new development plan by the commune of Sint-Josse/Saint-Josse. The Development Corporation’s “Opération Botanique” was distinctive in seeking both to preserve the neighbourhood’s urban structure and to maintain the existing population in place. Renovation work was easy and inexpensive, and carried out section by section, with only a small

number of residents temporarily decanted at any one time. The social services department were also involved, supporting residents and helping ensure that the renovations met their requirements. The operation drew inspiration from projects developed by the AAM and the ARAU. The heavy lines on the plan indicate those parts of the neighbourhood that were renovated and where necessary rebuilt in conformity with the existing street lines. 2.9 MOLENBEEK AFTER THE METRO – 1975-1979 Construction of the underground railway line that crosses Brussels West to East devastated the working-class neighbourhoods around Molenbeek town hall. Several counter-projects were presented to mend the wound it had left. In February 1975, the ARAU proposed a development plan for the block opposite the town hall, between the Graaf van Vlaanderenstraat/ Rue du Comte de Flandre and the canal, which limited the need for compulsory purchase and provided for the construction of social housing in keeping with the buildings already there. Respect for the existing layout would also allow phased implementation. Buildings old and new are framed by public green spaces. In November 1975, the housing ministry commissioned a development study for the waste ground left by the construction of the Metro line on the basis of the counter-projects presented by the AAM and the La Cambre students.

V. ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS

the human scale, respecting the scale of the earlier buildings and the alignments of the old streets. Emphasis was placed on pedestrian circulation, encouraged by greenways and covered arcades, public squares as spaces of encounter and conviviality, the integration of existing buildings into the urban fabric, and a mix of housing, employment and artisan production.

2.10 SAVING THE SINT-GORIKS/SAINT-GÉRY MARKET – 1979 In 1882, on the site of the old church of Sint-Gorik/Saint-Géry, just around the corner from the Bourse, a covered market was built in the neo-Flemish-Renaissance style, its uncluttered interior full of light. Abandoned since the Second World War, in 1980 the Sint-Goriks/SaintGéry market was threatened with demolition by the City of Brussels authorities, who wished to create an open space centred on the fountain and obelisk inside, survivals from the 18th-century square. Seeking to preserve the remarkable architecture of the market hall, the counter-project proposed to create a luxuriant winter garden, giving the building new functions based on the ideas of encounter, conviviality and relaxation, an island of greenery in a neighbourhood where most lived in flats. The counter-project played a key role in saving the market, now one of the highlights of the Lower Town. 2.11 CITÉ ADMINISTRATIVE DE L’ÉTAT – 1971-1972 Between the Congresplein/Place du Congrès and the Pachecolaan/ Boulevard Pachéco stand the enormous buildings of the Cité

stand to the south, believed in the Middle Ages to have healing powers. No longer a country road, the Gewijde Boomstraat/Rue de l’Arbre Bénit again underwent major changes from the 1960s onward; two big firms, the Solvay chemical company and the Compagnie du Gaz (a major energy supplier) built their headquarters there, demolishing a good many buildings in the process. This project proposed to rebuild neighbourhood housing and community facilities around the office buildings already in place. The students sought to reorganise the circulation, with a new street cutting through the block and a pedestrian arcade crossing through the Compagnie du Gaz building to connect with the Elsenesteenweg/Chaussée d’Ixelles. The rest of the site was devoted to housing and retail, while conserving such existing facilities as the Styx cinema.

2.12 THE MUSÉE D’ART MODERNE (MUSEUM OF MODERN ART)– 1973-1974 The early 1970s saw the start of a long conflict between the ARAU and the AAM on the one hand and the public authorities on the other, regarding the construction of a museum of modern art to complete the cultural complex that Léopold II (1835-1909) had envisaged for the Kunstberg/ Mont des Arts. The official plans provided for the museum to be buried under the Museumplein/Place du Musée, daylight coming from a light well in the middle. Entrance would be via a concrete building replacing the shops and housing of the Hofberg/Rue Montagne de la Cour and the Museumstraat/Rue du Musée. The opposition this aroused was justified, for the scheme shattered what remained of living urban continuity between the Upper and Lower Towns, from the Porte de Namur to the Grote Markt/Grand Place. The ARAU and the AAM organised a series of counter-projects and protests arguing for the refurbishment of existing buildings and the construction of new housing to complete the Museumplein/Place du Musée in keeping with the historic layout.

“THIS WILL SAVE THAT” “Casting a mournful glance from the book to the church, ‘Alas!’ he said, ‘This will destroy that’.” The words are those of Claude Frollo, archdeacon of Notre-Dame de Paris, in 1482, in Victor Hugo’s novel. The author goes on to explain: “Printing will destroy architecture. In fact, from the very beginning of things until the close of the fifteenth century AD, architecture was the great book of the human race, man’s chief means of expressing the varied stages of his development, material or mental. … Thus, until Gutenberg’s time, architecture was the chief, the universal form of writing.” The preservation of architectural archives, with a view to a reversal of roles that might be designated by “This will save that”, has helped secure the memory of an architecture now lost. Paper’s ability to withstand the destruction of a city of stone, brick and mortar has also assisted in raising public awareness of the importance of safeguarding the legacy that is the existing city, and in so doing has done much to influence public policy in the field. In this section, we look at a distinctive aspect of the archives, in the form of projects never built. Fruits of an imagination unconstrained by the demands of any client, or entries to architectural competitions, these plans testify to a city that didn’t happen, even if a good many of them went on to inspire projects that did become reality, for better or worse.

2.13 GEWIJDE BOOMSTRAAT/RUE DE L’ARBRE BÉNIT – 1979 Lying between Louisealaan/Avenue Louise and the Elsenesteenweg/ Chaussée d’Ixelles, the Gewijde Boomstraat/Rue de l’Arbre Bénit [the Street of the Blessed Tree] owes its name to an old lime tree that used to

VI. UNBUILT

Administrative de l’État (State Administraticve Center). Implanted on what had earlier been a very attractive site laid out in 1847 by architect Jean-Pierre Cluysenaar, this government building complex had a profound impact on the morphology of the neighbourhood. The underlying goal of this gigantic project, already under contemplation before the war, was the centralisation of government ministries with a view to the rationalisation of work and the reduction of costs. Begun in 1958, it entailed the destruction of a lively neighbourhood and also the loss of a monumental staircase. The work dragged on for 25 years, but by the time it was complete the devolution of central government functions had made it superfluous to requirements. This somewhat Soviet-looking ensemble also aggravated the divide between Upper and Lower Towns. The AAM’s counter-project gets rid of the huge finance ministry tower and narrows the boulevard to set alongside it a band of housing giving onto the gardens designed by René Pechère. It offers an alternative “to official visions of urban planning, of zoning and of car traffic in the historic city centre itself.”

VI. UNBUILT

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

PROJECTS FOR THE ALBERTINA REMODELLING THE CITY CENTRE THE LINEAR CITY HISTORICIST AND MODERNIST AUDACITIES BRUSSELS MODERNISES DESIGN FOR AN OFFICE BUILDING, GÉSU PROJECT

AXEL GHYSSAERT (1933) Design for an office building, Gésu project Sint-Joost-ten-Node/Saint-Josse-ten-Node, Koningsstraat/Rue Royale, Brialmontstraat/Rue Brialmont, Dwarsstraat/Rue Traversière and Staartsterstraat/Rue de la Comète, 1989-1992 Scale model, plan and photomontage Construction of scale model : Hugo Vandekeere, photomontage: Luc Thys

The office building was designed for a unique location opposite Kruidtuin/Botanique, on the Koningsstraat/Rue Royale side. The client was the property developer and contractor Pieters-De Gelder from Wetteren. The architect Axel Ghyssaert proposed different designs: an intersected pyramid and a large diagonal intersected rhomboid. This project was personally approved by Guy Cudell, mayor of Sint-Joostten-Node/Saint-Josse-ten-Node. But Pieters-Degeldere showed the most enthusiasm for Axel Ghyssaert’s third proposal. This consisted of a harmonious whole of a rectangular basic volume with façade columns at unequal intervals, forming a rhythmic and calm image. The largest façade along Koningstraat/Rue Royale is cut open as far as under the central spherical volume above the entrance hall, creating an impressive canopy. The white vertical play of lines of the base against the black horizontal lines in the sphere complement each other to form an architectural whole. The central supporting structure of the sphere, horizontally anchored in the basic volume, creates a floating image in the open base. In this design, the Kruidtuin/Botanique building and gardens mirror the office building, and vice versa.

VII. ON THE BARRICADES FOR ARCHITECTURAL CONSERVATION Nearly fifty years after their foundation, two Brussels archives join forces. These are exciting times. Not only will two important collections soon be housed under the same roof; this is also a meeting of activist legacies. Whilst well known for their archival activities, the Archives d’Architecture Moderne and the Sint-Lukasarchief also share their origins in the urban struggles, or “luttes urbaines”, of the 1970s. Energised by the student revolts of May 1968 in Paris, the civil rights movements and counter-cultural episode in the United States, also Brussels took to the barricades. The “Battle of the Marolles”, the struggles against the “Manhattanisation” of the North Quarter, and the resistance to the ITT project in the Louiza neighbourhood, were all signs of a city that stood up against it being at the mercy of developers, top-down planners, and the pursuit of profit and modernisation at the cost of local residents. Involved in these revolts were (architecture) students but also the citizens of Brussels, often organised in action committees.

VII. ON THE BARRICADES FOR ARCHITECTURAL CONSERVATION

This section, entitled “Unbuilt Brussels”, is intended as the first iteration of what is intended as an annual summer exhibition that will look each time at a different aspect of the rich collections of the SintLukasarchief and the Archives d’Architecture Moderne, now both part of the Modern Architecture department of the Civa Foundation.

WHEN KINDRED SPIRITS MEET In addition to architectural archives, the Archives d’Architecture Moderne and the Sint-Lukasarchief were, thus, also campaigners, activists, and even involved in architectural and urban design projects. It is in their activism that they have also met each other in the decades that have passed since 1968. This meeting was not always as partners. This was the case when, in response to the 1974 study by the Archives d’Architecture Moderne (Maurice Culot/ARAU) for the conservation and development of the Sint-Joost / Schaarbeek section of the Koningstraat/rue Royale, and aimed as input for a Plan Particulier d’Aménagement (P.P.A.), the SintLukasarchief developed a Plan Particulier de Protection) (P.P.B.). But when they did join forces, such as in the 1988 campaign called “Sauvez notre patrimoine Avenue Louise! Brusselse Louisalaan bedreigd!”, this was to great effect. Together with other action committees (e.g. ARAU. Inter-Environnement), Archives d’Architecture Moderne and the Sint-Lukasarchief campaigned to protect eleven 19th Century houses by prominent architects, set for demolition for the creation of a multi-functional complex known as the Forum Louise (and better known as the Wiltcher’s project). They managed to collect hundreds of signatures from national and international individuals including prominent international

VIIl. VISUALS

TIMELINE 1968-1988

architects such as Ricardo Bofill, Herman Hertzberger, Mario Botta, Phyllis Lambert, and Leon Krier. As a result, the demolition works were halted. In sharing a combining of historical preservation with urban activism and projections into the future, the Archives d’Architecture Moderne and the Sint-Lukasarchief bring to the fore a legacy of activist archives that is now, excitingly so, coming together. They may have had distinct ideas on how exactly the preservation of the past and projection into the future should occur. And these solutions may, at times, have met with scepticism, even resistance, within the wider architectural community. And yet, the Sint-Lukasarchief and the Archives d’Architecture Moderne’s relentless efforts in convincing, pressuring, and irritating those in power, has resulted in many an architectural and urban treasure in Brussels being rescued or protected from demolition. Dr Isabelle Doucet, The University of Manchester

TIMELINE 1968-1988

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

TIMELINE 1968-1988

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

TIMELINE 1968-1988

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

ABOUT SIX KEY PROJECTS

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

ABOUT SEVEN KEY PROJECTS

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS

SAVE/ CHANGE THE CITY â&#x20AC;&#x201C; UNBUILT BRUSSELS #01

ARCHITECTURAL COUNTER-PROJECTS

This book was published at the occasion of the exhibition Save/ Change The City – Unbuilt Brussels #01 at CIVA Foundation from 23th of June till 24th of September 2017

04 02

Descriptions pages 62-64 08

01. NORTHERN QUARTER – 1976 – 1978 | 02. WHEN THE ARMY LEAVES… – 1974 – 1978 | 03. RECONSTRUCTION OF THE FACADE OF THE HÔTEL AUBECQ – 1979 | 04. CITÉ ADMINISTRATIVE DE L’ÉTAT – 1971 – 1972 | 05. SIX PROPOSALS FOR THE SQUARE DU BASTION – 1974 – 1975 | 06. MOLENBEEK AFTER THE METRO – 1975 – 1979 | 07. PROPOSAL FOR THE RECONSTRUCTION IN BRUSSELSOF THE BATTLE OF THE YSER PANORAMA - 1977 | 08. KUNSTWIJK/QUARTIER DES ARTS – 1978 | 09. NORTHSOUTH CONNECTION – 1976 – 1978

COLOPHON Catalog by Stéphanie De Blieck, Lola Pirlet and Dieter Vanthournout Graphic design : Neutre.be

EXHIBITION An exhibition presented at the CIVA Foundation, produced by the department of Modern Architecture

Fondation CIVA stichting Yves Goldstein, President

Pieter Van Damme, Director

Director of Modern Architecture Department Yaron Pesztat

Curators Maurice Culot, Yaron Pesztat, Jos Vandenbreeden

Graphic Design Neutre.be

Production and footage Millenium

Texts Maurice Culot, Yaron Pesztat, Lola Pirlet, Jos Vandenbreeden

Translation Gitracom, Miguel Angel Hernandez, Wouter Meeus, Dafydd Roberts, Maxime Schouppe, Catherine Warnant

Coordination, production, educational projects and communication Jamal Ahrouch, Danny Casseau, Mostafa Chafi, Catherine Cnudde, Germaine Courtois, Stéphanie De Blieck, Patrick Demuylder, Renaud De Staercke, Dominique Dehenain, Sophie Gentens, Sébastien Gillette, Manon Kempinaire, Anne Lauwers, Christophe Meaux, Véronique Moerman, Luc Nagels, Lola Pirlet, Anne-Marie Pirlot, Laureline Tissot, Sandra Van Audenaerde, Dieter Vanthournout, Vitalie Construct, Mihai Minecan

And the entire team of CIVA Foundation Aïcha Benzaktit, Cindy Bertiau, Marcelline Bosquillon, Francelle Cane, Jacques de Neuville, Oana De Wolf, Anna Dukers, Chaïmae El Ahmadi, Andrea Flores, Ophélie Goemaere, Eric Hennaut, Tania Isabel Garduño, Anne-Catherine Laroche, Hugo Martin, Salima Masribatti, Noëlla Mavula, Mabiala Mpiniabo M’Bulayi, Pascale Rase, Inge Taillie, Sarah Tibaux, Martine Van Heymbeeck, Vincent Vanhoutte

With the support of ARAU, Inter environnement Bruxelles, Sonuma, Brigitte D’helft, Marie Demanet, Bernard de Walque, Michel Leloup