Un progettare sensibile
In the heart of Hasselt, a place that remained secluded and quiet for centuries is once again entering into dialogue with the city. Through a project by Bovenbouw Architectuur in collaboration with David Kohn Architects, the eighteenth-century Beguinage has been transformed into the new home of Hasselt University’s Faculty of Architecture and, at the same time, the largest public green space in the historic centre. A complex conceived for introspection has thus been reactivated as civic infrastructure, welcoming students, residents and visitors alike.
The beguines, religious women who had not taken formal vows, established protected settlements in the Middle Ages, enclosed and set apart from urban life. Hasselt’s Beguinage, occupying some 6,800 square metres in the city centre, had retained this sense of seclusion. The destruction of the central church during the Second World War left a silent ruin, while the gardens, set back and difficult to reach, had come to feel like residual spaces. Despite occasional cultural uses, the complex had gradually lost its public role.
The turning point came in 2018, with the international competition organised by Team Vlaams Bouwmeester, which paved the way for a transformation that was both far-reaching and measured. The project avoids both freezing the site as a museum piece and imposing disruptive gestures, opting instead for a patient transformation grounded in adaptive reuse and renewed connections with the city. The first indication of this approach is the site’s new permeability: a circular entrance cut into the historic wall breaches a physical and symbolic barrier, inviting urban life to flow in. Within the enclosure, a network of public paths traverses a sequence of “green rooms”, restoring the garden to collective use.
Architecture and landscape remain in constant dialogue. The footprint of the lost church is not rebuilt but reinterpreted as a reflecting pool: a space of stillness and remembrance that gives the ruin an active role in the everyday life of the campus. When required, the pool can be drained, turning the area into a stage for university events and public performances. Alongside the carefully restored historic structures, a new contemporary marker emerges: a slender, lightweight, thirty-metre belvedere tower in the southern corner of the complex. Rising above the perimeter wall to a height comparable to that of the original church, the tower is more than a vantage point. It is an urban gesture that restores the Beguinage’s presence on Hasselt’s skyline.
The refurbishment of the terraced houses approaches adaptive reuse with a sensitivity to their domestic character. The spaces have been reconfigured to accommodate the academic programme without losing their original intimate scale. The transition between public and private gives rise to precise, sometimes playful interventions: former fireplaces become doorways, historic panelling is incorporated into new door leaves, and contemporary connections merge with traces of the past. New copper dormers turn the attics into light-filled studios, while a consistent system of oak frames relates the new elements to the material character of the existing buildings. The houses accommodate the Faculty of Architecture’s master’s programmes, research spaces, workshops, exhibitions and accommodation for doctoral students. The entrance building, meanwhile, houses an auditorium open to the wider public and a small museum devoted to the history of the site.
A strong ethic of repair informs the entire project. Local and traditional materials have been salvaged and reused, from oak furniture and purplish-brown bricks to clay flooring and bluestone elements. Wherever possible, restoration has been favoured over replacement: roof tiles, flooring, windows, stairs and sills have been dismantled, repaired and reinstated. Only where reuse proved impracticable were matching materials sourced locally. The furnishing strategy follows the same philosophy: the Rotor collective selected second-hand furniture, reinforcing the project’s commitment to sustainability. Improvements to the buildings’ energy performance, including insulation beneath the roofs and insulating lime plaster, complete the intervention without altering its character.
The project is punctuated by details that are carefully considered and restrained, yet strongly expressive. They preserve the memory of the place while asserting a distinctly contemporary sensibility. As Dirk Somers of Bovenbouw Architectuur has observed, architecture here succeeds in holding together opposing aspirations: openness and intimacy, memory and contemporary use. At the same time, as David Kohn has emphasised, a series of careful, measured interventions has finally allowed Hasselt’s Beguinage to realise its full potential.
The sensitivity of these two leading European practices demonstrates how productive collaboration between professionals can be, offering clients and local authorities greater assurance of quality and care, particularly when projects engage with such sensitive parts of our historic centres.