Bâtiment Comenius (ancienne école normale provinciale de filles) — Louvain

Art Deco building erected in 1931 as a provincial teacher-training school for girls to a design by Raymond Poppe, municipal architect of Ixelles, selected after an architectural competition (building permit of 15 June 1931); it is named after the theologian, philosopher and educational reformer Jan Amos Komensky (Comenius). The complex, described as strict Art Deco, follows an elongated U-shaped plan of two to four storeys; its white-rendered main façade on the Tiensevest has seven bays grouped between broad stepped pilasters crowned by flagpoles, which contrast with the horizontal bands of windows. The monumental entrance is marked by a coffered canopy carried by two stepped pilasters and topped by two statues of reading women in white plaster. The Art Deco style is carried through from exterior to interior as a total design: an entrance hall with black and ochre marble walls, a three-storey atrium with coffered ceilings, stairs of marble, granito and tiles with marble statues by G. Vandevoorde, colourful tiling and inlaid parquet floors. The buildings added between 1952 and 1974 differ from the 1931 architecture. The building is recorded in the Flemish architectural heritage inventory.

Translated from the French original.