A former Brussels music hall building from the 1930’s (with a façade by famous local modernist architect Victor Bourgeois) converted into a cinema in the 1960’s and later abandoned in the 1980’s. A beautiful and difficult heritage building to convert into the new ‘laboratory for cultural and citizen expressions’ for Bruxelles Laïque, an institution working on an innovative and ambitious socio-urban agenda. The project aims to keep as much as possible the existing qualities of the former music venue and transform it into the new public forum. Two new ‘black box’ venues are linked to the forum: one below and the other above the historical ‘Café Bagdad’ with its loggia to the street. Special care was taken to the dialogue of ‘old and new’ and daylight entrance inside the building. A project tailored for this specific site and existing building, yet very flexible, offering a generous range of uses and possibilities.

A complex building, an ambitious program, a great collaboration with Flores y Prats and Bruxelles Laïque.