Woonhuis, Steenbergsestraat 27

English translation

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Description

Introduction.

The RESIDENTIAL HOUSE in Neo-renaissance style was built in 1892 according to a design by architect P.J. van Genk. The client was C. de Meulemeester-Van Hasselt. The building, which later served as a tax office, has been in use as a residential house since 1999.

Description.

The two-storey symmetrical building has a square floor plan with a flat roof and hipped roofs with slate in Maas coverage all around. The cellar building comprises five bays and stands almost detached between two gates. The facades are built of machine-made brick and articulated by ashlar bands and pilasters. The plinth with grilles over cellar windows, window sills, diamond bosses and surrounds of the sash windows and the glazed door are also of ashlar. Centrally situated is the glazed door with stairs in a richly worked round-arched portico. The doors and the round-arched fanlight are fitted with ornamental wrought ironwork. Above the portico an ashlar balcony on heavy volute consoles. The round arches of the balustrade recur as blind arches in the breastwall of the sash windows on the first floor. These windows are topped by a straight-lined moulded cornice, the balcony doors further by a arched pediment. The frieze is richly executed and the moulded cornice rests on blocks. The roof section is interrupted by three roof dormers with segmental arch pediments. The central one is accentuated and executed doubly. The side facades and rear facade are sober in brick, with ashlar sills at the windows but without further decoration. The interior of the central corridor is intact. The floor and part of the wall panelling are of white marble. The walls are articulated by Corinthian pilasters. On either side of the entrance there is a double door with ornamental stucco work. The ceiling is fitted with stucco rosettes and ornamental mouldings on consoles. The building contains six marble fireplaces, of which only the fireplace with Tuscan columns in the front room to the left of the entrance is still authentic. The ceilings with broad ornamental mouldings and stucco rosettes are intact in the front room, the hall, the garden room, the central hall and landing, as well as in three bedrooms and on the first floor. A wooden staircase provides access to the storeys. The main baluster has a dragon-form, with its head holding a ball in its mouth. The remaining balusters are executed in vase-form. In the central hall, the stairwell and the landing, the original multicoloured wall and ceiling decorations were partially restored in 1999. In two bedrooms traces of original ceiling decorations are still visible.

Valuation.

The building is of general importance because of: - cultural-historical value as an example of urban scaling up shortly before 1900; - typology, because of the building type solid town house with characteristic floor plan (central corridor, left transverse corridor and rooms, right the suite); - importance for architectural history, the work of architect P. van Genk, because of the very rich execution in neo-renaissance style regarding material and detailing, both interior and exterior; - the spacious layout of the bel-étage with a very monumental, half-oval staircase; - wall and ceiling paintings, stucco work, fireplaces, doors, interior shutters etc.; - the integrity of exterior and of structure and interior details; - the structural and visual integrity of the urban setting; - rarity of such spacious and intact preserved houses.