Magasins Waucquez

1906 Victor Horta

Rue des sables 20 | Bruxelles

Ch. Bastin & J. Evrard © urban.brussels
Main staircase, first landing (photo ca 1990)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Streetlight and staircase, hall, ground floor (photo 1971)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Detail of the small columns supporting the exposed metal framework (photo 1971)
L'Émulation, 1908, pl.3
Façade (photo ca 1908)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Staircase leading to the upper floor, first floor (photo 1971)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Façade (photo 1971)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Shelves, first floor (photo 1971)
© KIK-IRPA, Brussels
Showroom, first floor (photo 1971)
Horta Museum Archives, Saint-Gilles
Grand entrance hall (old photograph)
Horta Museum Archives, Saint-Gilles
Entrance hall (old photograph)
Horta Museum Archives, Saint-Gilles
Main staircase (old photograph)

This former store (which today houses the Belgian Comic Strip Centre) is an Art Nouveau masterpiece designed by Victor Horta. Refreshingly, this was not a private residence, but a “temple of commerce”; textile merchant Charles Wauquez commissioned Horta to build a new wholesale outlet in which he could both receive his customers and store his stock.


Protected heritage in Brussels Learn more Inventory of architectural heritage
The façade is fairly harmonious and just contoured in the centre. On the ground floor, note the nameplate on the left and the service door on the right.
Look at the blue stone base! Horta used this feature as a way of subtly offsetting the slope of the street, thereby rebalancing the façade.

Visitors to the Comic Strip Centre can easily see this former store at the same time. Having gone through the entrance porch, you reach an interior space illuminated by a street light and a glazed skylight. The staircase there evokes the splendour of Classical architecture, in keeping with the space. The ironwork on the bannister features the motif of a flower emerging from two stylised leaves, which is repeated in the railings on the first floor.

Nearby

By the same architect