Description
This corner house was built for a lawyer and his family. It is a V-shaped volume that follows the geometry of the two adjacent streets and encloses a small courtyard that brings additional light into the heart of the building. On the ground floor, leaving a garage to the left, the entrance opens onto a large hall serving two offices. The hall leads to a staircase with floating steps set into the side walls. The first floor contains the family’s living quarters: a kitchen and dining room on the east side and a cloakroom and large living room in the west wing. Part of this space is double-height – allowing for a visual connection with the second floor, where the bedrooms are located. Organised around a central landing, there is a master bedroom and bathroom to the west and a children’s wing to the east. The latter is organised into four small bedrooms which extend via movable partitions into a large corridor-playroom.
The third floor accommodates a central workroom with two adjacent bedrooms and a large terrace. As in many of his projects, the furniture was designed by the architect himself. The building features a concrete structure with various infills combining red and glass bricks and frame elements. The flat concrete roof is extended by a triangular canopy supported by a pillar adjoining a small garden on the corner of the plot.
Front view
Rear view
Originally published in: Gérald Ledent, Alessandro Porotto, Brussels Housing. Atlas of Residential Building Types, Birkhäuser, 2023.