Villa Empain (Fondation Boghossian)

A temple of Brussels Art Deco, commissioned in 1930 by Baron Louis Empain from Michel Polak and his partner Alfred Hoch. Built between 1931 and 1934 on the edge of the Bois de la Cambre, the villa combines luxurious materials (polished Baveno granite façades, gilded brass, marbles) with the influence of the Vienna Secession. Given to the State in 1937, taken over by the Gestapo in 1943, then the Soviet embassy and, from 1980 to 1993, the seat of RTL, it then stood empty for many years. Listed in 2007 and bought by the Boghossian Foundation, which restored it, it opened to the public in 2010 as an arts centre.

Translated from the French original.