Since October 2016, the ULB’s Faculté d’Architecture La Cambre Horta has been Flagey’s new hotspot. The extensive refurbishment of the ground floor of the architecture faculty by Lhoas & Lhoas allows both students and the local community to experience how the university and the city can reinforce one another.

The building, an anonymous twin of Diongre’s iconic NIR building—which is twenty years younger—had, until recently, turned its back on the lively Flagey Square. A tangle of corridors and small, enclosed spaces facing the square, used for storage, formed an impenetrable barrier between the school and the city. Yet the students are not aspiring architects in an ivory tower; they need to engage in dialogue with one another and with the city. With that aim in mind, Lhoas & Lhoas combine a clear vision with a radical intervention.