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About Juliaan Lampens
Juliaan Lampens (1926-2019) was one of Belgium's most uncompromising and visionary modernist architects. From his small village of Eke, just outside Ghent, he developed a body of work that feels as much sculptural as architectural, bold, radical, and deeply rooted in material honesty. After founding his practice in 1950, Lampens initially worked in a more traditional style, but his visit to the 1958 Brussels World's Fair marked a turning point. He shifted toward a brutalist approach, building his own concrete home in 1960 as a manifesto of a new way of living, open, raw and unified. Lampens worked almost exclusively with concrete, solid wood, and glass. He designed homes without corridors or separate rooms, favouring open plans where all living functions coexisted within a single flowing space. Walls gave way to mass, symmetry to balance, and privacy to placement. His belief in "living without barriers" was not just spatial, but philosophical, prioritising equality, simplicity and human connection over convention.
His architectural masterpieces include the Chapel of Kerselare in Oudenaarde, House Vandenhaute, Kiebooms in Zingem, and the now-iconic House Van Wassenhove in Deurle. Each of these buildings reflects his signature language, monolithic forms anchored in the landscape, refined by an acute sense of proportion, light and silence. While Lampens' work remained relatively unknown internationally for much of his life, a major retrospective and the 2010 publication Juliaan Lampens (edited by Angélique Campens) brought overdue recognition. Since then, his influence has only grown, inspiring architects, designers and collectors worldwide who value purity, presence and timeless design. Today, Lampens is considered one of Belgium's most important post-war architects. His furniture, often custom-designed for his buildings, shows the same radical clarity, rare pieces that speak of structure, space, and uncompromising vision.