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Home Peter Benoit et Home Jan Blockx — Anvers

Home Peter Benoit et Home Jan Blockx — Anvers
Photo : Braeken, Jo · CC BY 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Architect
Jan Vanhoenacker, John Van Beurden, Jos Smolderen, Van Riel et Van den Bergh (contractor)
Date
1931 (begun 1930)
Type
residential
Style
Art Deco
City
Antwerp
Status
inventoried
Address
Grétrystraat 2, 2A-C, 2018 Antwerpen

Art Deco apartment building on the corner of Grétrystraat and Belgiëlei, designed in 1930 by the architects Jan Vanhoenacker, John Van Beurden and Jos Smolderen; it was built on its own account by E.M.B.A.M., a subsidiary of the general contractor Van Riel & Van den Bergh, to provide work for its staff during the crisis that followed 1929. It is probably the firm's last joint work; planned for 23 flats, it ended up with 21 after two ground-floor flats were joined in 1931 with those above to form duplexes. On a Hennebique-type reinforced-concrete frame, the building of two by eleven bays has eight storeys under a flat roof; the head block on the Belgiëlei, treated as a square tower faced with white stone, is set apart from the brick wing on the Grétrystraat, which is punctuated by three-sided bay windows rising over six storeys. The city architect Emiel Van Averbeke, objecting to the combination of white stone and 'very red' brick, imposed yellow brick; during construction, however, this was departed from by choosing clamp-fired bricks selected for their yellow tint. A fluted frieze and a chevron frieze crown the façades, and the wrought-iron entrance doors and the window grilles survive. The building is recorded in the Flemish architectural heritage inventory.

Translated from the French original.

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Entry checked in October 2026

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