St Catherine's Church

This church was built between 1854 and 1874 on a filled-in dock that had formed part of the Port of Brussels, and replaced a fifteenth-century church, whose Baroque bell-tower has survived nearby. The project was managed by the architect Joseph Poelaert, who designed and bult an Eclectic building which mixes Gothic forms and Baroque decoration, inspired by sixteenth-century French church designs. From a sturdy crypt of reinforced bluestone rises a tall nave of Gobertange stone, supported by flying buttresses that creates a finely-balanced whole. The sobriety of the interior is reinforced by the white-rendered walls. The uniform Neo-Renaissance furnishings were designed by the Goyers Brothers firm of Leuven.