Revisiter la tour Brunfaut (Julien Roggen, début 1965) ou de la réécriture du « patrimoine ordinaire » bruxellois

Abstract

Erected in less than a year, the Brunfaut Tower, the first steel-framed housing tower in Brussels, demonstrates an exceptional economy of means and materials. It constitutes a rare testimony of an era when efficiency predominated over performance. Its fine, slender architecture and the design of its facades help define its resolutely modern identity.Despite its qualities, it has had a difficult reception; its inhabitants having given it the nickname “the cardboard box". For more than twenty years, arguments have been raised against the uncomfortable and unhealthy conditions in the building. The experimental dimension of some constructive and technical choices, in addition to the lack of maintenance, make his other more positive qualities unrecognizable.After many years of procrastination, a feasibility survey was conducted by Lacaton, Vassal and Druot that led to the heavy and irreversible renovation of the tower, supporting the advent of a "new image" while also preserving its symbolic imprint in the Brussels landscape.This monographic contribution reveals a certain number of incompatibilities between the stated goals of this renovation and the imposed programmatic constraints. As a result, the designers have struggled to combine all of their stated objectives into a coherent, balanced whole, and the building’s heritage value is now affected.This article is also an occasion to have a look at the state of affairs in Brussels and to cast light on the “interventionist policies" on the post-war built heritage, of which Julien Roggen’s Brunfaut tower is a—regrettably—emblematic example.

Keywords

• heritage of the 20th century
• living and comfort
• intervention strategies
• metal structure
• light facade
• collective housing