Maison de la Culture de la Province de Namur / Philippe Samyn and Partners

The building - This cultural center sits in the center of Namur, on the north bank of the Sambre River, facing the historic center of the town known as "Le Grognon". Designed by Victor Bourgeois and built at the start of the 1960s, the building required renovation and extension to meet the current requirements of local people and to accommodate the redevelopment of the rue des Bouchers and the banks of the Sambre River. The building used to consist of a 400-seater theatre at one end of a rectangular box-shaped space on four levels with a south-facing curtain wall (looking over the Sambre River) built up against a curved rectangular box-shaped space on five levels, known as the "croissant", which has an east-facing curtain wall and a south-facing end wall which has no openings.