FALL SEMESTER 2025
KUL / CAMPUS SINT-LUCAS BRUSSELS
A POLICY WHISPERING PRAXIS
A ROYAL GIFT ?
PETER SWINNEN
Our architecture studio is interested in testing architecture’s capacity as an unsolicited and pro-active tool for political policy making. How can architecture critically inform and challenge social, spatial and ecology policies? Can the architect perform as an effective “policy whisperer” for the sake of common good? And is architecture’s role to reactively answer a brief or could it prefigure the brief, and even the (public) client for that matter?
For the lustrum 2022-2026 the atelier has embarked on a long-term commitment vis-à-vis the community of Tervueren (50° 49’ N, 4° 31’ E), one of Europe’s most intriguing environments, both a hamlet and a world-site. Semester per semester, we spatially and politically scrutinize this petite capitale mondiale, in close collaboration with local entities, political decision makers and stakeholders.
As an intrinsic part of the green belt around Brussels, Tervueren can be considered as a ‘Green Colony’, not in the least in its historical sense. For it was King Leopold II, with his barbaric import of colonial wealth at the end of the 19th century that laid the very socio-cultural and ecological foundations of contemporary Tervueren. A Chinese puzzle of lush parks, protected fields and forests form its bucolic core. As an iron lung to Brussels, this hinterland is an intriguing – schizophrenic – testing ground for political and policy experimentation through architectural reflection and project-making.
THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL ARBORETUME (2014)
The analysis of the potentials and pitfalls of Tervueren as a ‘Green Colony’ will lie at the heart of our design-driven policy whispering praxis. We will aim at establishing futureproof environments in and around Tervueren, provoking more equitable balances on social inclusivity, productive landscapes, as well as enhancing Tervueren’s cultural diversities.
‘THE ROYAL DONATION’ TRUST _ TERVUEREN (2025)
PROPERTY OVERVIEW & POTENTIAL SITES (= DARK GREEN ZONES)
THE GREEN PROVOCATION
The forthcoming semester we will explore the untapped potentials of the ‘awaiting’ properties of ‘The Royal Donation’ Trust. In 1900, King Leopold II donated a myriad of properties to the Belgian State, amongst which the Royal Glasshouses (Laeken), Stuyvenberg Castel, Duden Park (Vorst) and the Geographic Arboretum in Tervueren. The Royal Donation possesses not less than 445 ha of land in Tervueren, making up ca. 13% of the municipality’s territory. A large part is protected, yet quite some strategic parts are (passively) awaiting a further future.
With Tervueren currently being in dire need of adequate facilities for local and communal spaces of encounter – formal and informal – the ‘superstructure’ of the Royal Donation might be an unhoped for
‘gift’ of sorts. At least a firm basis and red thread for further social, political and ecological compensation for a (recent) past of unauthorized hedonism. Our unsolicited analysis and proposals for reviving the cohabitation of nature, ecology and social life will aim to trigger future policies of The Royal Donation Trust.
THE STUDIO
Studio participants will be encouraged to think politically and act strategically, so that real-time impact can be generated. Our sole nexus is to “find cracks in the system”, necessary to invoke change and evolution through architectural practice. Hence, we are interested in strong designers, clear thinkers and true team players that understand architecture as a strategic tool, never as a goal in itself.
Throughout the semester the work of the studio will be assessed by various invited experts, e.g. Kevin Knevels (Forest Ranger Tervueren/The Royal Donation Trust), dr. arch. Ivonne Weichold (Ecological Productive Landscapes), Christiane Gerlach-Scheerer (European Baumeister), … On a weekly basis, the studio will be queried and steered by arch. Peter Swinnen (CRIT. architects, www.CRIT.cc).
AGENDA
The studio’s agenda reads as follows (starting with guided tours of the sites):
August 17th, 2025