Beautiful Belgian houses

Column by Ian Witte

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

No statement is more valid than this one when I mention my liking of Belgian houses to my family. At first they would ask, “what is so special about Belgian houses?” Then I would show them a picture of a house that is far from the ordinary (figure 1). In response, my family would look at me as though something was terribly wrong with me, which has, quite frankly, some truth to it. Because, why would someone have a liking for a phenomenon known as ‘ugly Belgian houses’?

Figure 1: one example of what people may consider to be an ugly Belgian house. Source: Hannes Coudenys, 2021. Wikimedia Commons. CC-BY-SA 4.0. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UBG-66.jpg

When we talk about ugly Belgian houses, we can’t skip the name of Hannes Coudenys, who brought the concept to life. He published multiple books on the topic (Coudenys, 2015; 2021; 2026), with the final one about to be published at the time of writing this column. The books bear, what is in Coudenys’ eyes, the reasons behind the origin of this phenomenon. From what I understand, unlike The Netherlands, the Belgian authorities are less strict about their urban regulations. Citizens enjoy a lot more freedom in designing their houses and gardens. And this architectural freedom breeds anarchism. A surprising number of Belgians commissioned architects to design houses that try to be unique, with some absurd results. Surely the homeowners may be judged for their unique tastes, but no one can stop them from building their dreams. And I think this sort of absurdism is precisely the thing that makes these houses so beautiful: they have personality – arguably manifesting the personality of their owner. Something we are gravely lacking in The Netherlands.

Although Coudenys detested the anarchistic Belgian architecture at first, he has grown fond of it in the end. On a similar note, we have Mark van Wonderen in The Netherlands. He wrote the book ‘Treurtrips’ (2020), which TOPOS covered extensively in the past. It is about the ugliest places in the Netherlands, most often revolving around the modernist architecture from the 1960s and ‘70s. Van Wonderen argues that we should embrace these kinds of places, before some top-down government discovers that they don’t meet current standards and decides to replace them with new developments. And I am inclined to agree. Surely, the spatial quality isn’t the best. But, although these places have been developed top-down, they are full of stories that shaped their personality. After all, the residents have had decades to push the boundaries of their properties. Sometimes literally; as an example, one post-war neighbourhood in my hometown consists of rowhouses. There used to be a liminal space between the backyard’s premise and the bordering bicycle path. Somehow, all homeowners collectively decided to extend their backyard all the way to the bicycle path, consuming this liminal space. This led to a chaotic façade of walls and sheds right at the path’s edge (figure 2), defying important design guidelines. Yet, to this day, the local government has been unsuccessful at reclaiming this once-public land.

Figure 2: an unorganized mess of sheds and fences of people’s backyards. Further in the back is even a hedge growing over the bicycle path. Source: Ian Witte, 2026.

Another example from my hometown is a neighbourhood where all buildings are painted white. Until, one day, one homeowner decided to paint her house mint-green. This led to opposition from her neighbours and a lawsuit that stretched on for years. The judge’s final decision: the house’s colour was allowed to deviate, but it had to be repainted in a less-intrusive colour.

In my opinion, we Dutch people can learn something from ugly Belgian houses. Give the residents some power. Let them be bold. Be playful. Do something to be unique. Their houses may be ugly, but at least they are exciting. In TOPOS’ previous theme of Totalitarianism, Tobias argued that many places in The Netherlands are still being designed top-down, where new restrictions and a need for spatial quality drive boring, monotone and uniform urbanism. I have the feeling that with each of these iterations, there is less room for personality. Back when I studied landscape architecture, I visited one reference project – a new neighbourhood in Maastricht (figure 3). Sure, it is new, clean, safe, with a clear spatial coherence and ties to the genius loci. But do consider the fact that these buildings are literally boxes. Square. Edgy. Cold. Pale. It makes me question whether the architect was deprived of inspiration and imagination. How are the residents ever supposed to give their own personal touch here? I don’t mean to say that we should completely overthrow our system. I am merely asking architects and policymakers one thing; please give your buildings some wiggle room for residents to give their façades, and thus the urban fabric, a truly unique character.

Figure 3: newly built neighbourhood in Maastricht. Source: Ian Witte, 2024.

References

Coudenys, H. (2015). Ugly Belgian houses: don't try this at home. Borgerhoff & Lamberigts.

Coudenys, H. (2021). More Ugly Belgian Houses. Borgerhoff & Lamberigts.

Coudenys, H. (2026). Ugly Belgian Houses: The Final Edition. Borgerhoff & Lamberigts.

Van Wonderen, M. & Huntelaar, Y. (2020). Treurtrips: (her)ontdek Nederland! Rubinstein.