Maison et immeuble Verswijver — Anvers

Complex formed by a town house with an artist's studio and an apartment building, in a matter-of-fact Art Deco style ("zakelijke art-decostijl"), built for J. and P. Verswijver after a 1927 design by the architects Paul Smekens and Carlos Van der Voodt, one of their first joint projects; construction was under way in 1928. Detached, four wide bays and four storeys high under a pseudo-mansard, it has a perfectly symmetrical front that conceals the different layout of the two buildings; the inventory traces the articulated relief of its projecting and recessed planes, buttresses and short canopies, and its marked horizontals, to Dudok and, through him, to the influence of Frank Lloyd Wright. The wine-red Belvédère brick, laid in a horizontal bond with deep joints, contrasts with the white stone of the ground floor and surrounds, and the wrought-iron grilles have a typical Art Deco pattern. Three bronze leopards modelled from life by the Antwerp animal sculptor Albéric Collin accentuate the façade from tall pedestals. The interior of the house, with the built-in furniture designed by Smekens, the marble chimneypieces and the wooden grand staircase, is entirely preserved. The complex has been protected as a monument since 1995.

Translated from the French original.