Major Town Houses

Since by the year 2024 “everyone has been everywhere” and many have become serious about WH travel planning, it has been hard to find a place and time for a WHS meet-up. The best chances are those special opportunities that unlock places where access isn’t common. This year we have Astraftis a.k.a. Stormur to thank for pointing out the opening up of Hôtel Tassel, one of the Major Town Houses of Victor Horta, on the 3rd of August. It led to a meet-up of 8 WH travellers.

Hôtel Tassel is very little visited - 100 visitors a year were given when the WHS was inscribed in 2000: it is in private ownership and in daily use as an office. They usually open it once or twice a year via a guided tour (keep an eye open for tickets on the website of Explore Brussels). On the morning that we visited, 5 groups, divided into French/Dutch/English language tours, were allowed in (20pax each).

Hôtel Tassel is the work with the most historic value among the 4 Horta Houses. ICOMOS started its review with the sentence “The Hôtel Tassel can be considered the founding work of Art Nouveau”. The tour started in the street in front of it - even when the house is closed to the public, it is worth it to walk by and admire the façade. It stands out among the neighbouring houses with its characteristic steel ornaments, undulating shapes and overall luxurious appearance.

Once …

Hôtel Solvay is a late 19th-century city villa in Brussels by the design of the Belgian architect Victor Horta. It is 1 of his 4 Major Town Houses. I visited it two weeks ago on a special tour in Dutch. They want to keep it exclusive: the tours are only once a month and a ticket costs 40 EUR. You must also book well in advance online. In 2002 I already had been to one of the other locations (the Horta House & Atelier Museum), which has no such visitor limitations. It lies only 500m away from the Solvay and a third location (Hôtel Tassel) is also just around the corner.

At noon, around 25 visitors gathered in front of the imposing façade of the Hotel Solvay at the Avenue Louise number 224. We were given solid plastic covers for our shoes so that we would not tarnish the interior. This is now a busy neighbourhood, with a lot of traffic, embassies, shops and restaurants. The 19th-century house is wedged between two ugly office buildings. When the house was built it was free-standing and occupied a large piece of land: 15 meters wide and 20 meters deep on the main avenue between the city center and the surrounding forests of Brussels.

The tour started with an explanation about the Solvay family, who had this house built in 1894. They had become rich in the chemical production of soda and gave Victor Horta a free hand to design a …

Here is another World Heritage Site in Brussels that has been listed but is difficult for the public to access. Three of the four houses are really difficult, although there are some limited opening times for one of them..

Unlike the other three Victor Horta houses in Brussels that are part of the World Heritage Site, the Horta Museum does give you the opportunity to go inside one of the original buildings and get a sense of the design and layout.

Rather than just read about the influence on Art Nouveau architecture, you can see it for yourself. Rather than just look at each element in books or online, you can feel how they merge together. The opening hours are still somewhat limited, though.

During my summer vacation in Brussels I visited the four inscribed Horta houses. The Horta Museum is lovely and nicely overwhelming. An absolut must. Since the other three houses are not open I booked a tour on Arau.org. They make an Art Nouveau tour every saturday and visit two houses (not necessarily by Horta). In our tour we visited the Maison Autriche and the Maison Eetvelde, both by Horta. The first one is a museum that you can visit independently but the second is a privat house with a very nice interior. In general though I would not really recommend this tour. The group was very big and the tour was given in French and English by one guide. She was decently knowledgable but she often made mistakes and she gave all the explanation in both languages. Sometimes the group was split and entered the house in turns. All of this meant a lot of waiting, lots of repeats. And in the end it was a three hour tour and only ten minutes in the Maison Eetvelde, that you couldn't enter normally. If you know a little about Art Nouveau the only reason to take the tour is to get inside one of the private houses but be sure to check beforehand which houses are on the schedule.

Otherwise I recommend to visit the Horta Museum and the other Horta houses that are open to the public like the Maison Autriche and the comic museum. The Maison Tassel and Solvay …

Now that Spring is in the air, I decided to go for a stroll round Brussels to view the exterior facades of the 4 inscribed town houses of Horta and other main Art Nouveau sites in Brussels. The only town house that is open on a regular basis is the Horta Museum, however when there is the Art Nouveau Biennale, the other town houses are opened to the public and can also be visited with the Biennale registered tour guides (like I did in 2011 when I visited Hotel Tassel and Hotel Solvay). Here are a few addresses that might come in handy should you be in Brussels:

- Maison & Atelier Horta Museum (open from 14:00 to 17:30) = Rue Americaine 25, 1060 Brussels

- Hotel Tassel = Rue Paul Emile Janson 6, 1050 Brussels

- Hotel Solvay = Avenue Louise 224, 1050 Brussels

- Hotel Van Eetvelde = Avenue Palmerston 2-6, 1040 Brussels

Top Art Nouveau sites in Brussels worth visiting:

- Maison St. Cyr = Ambroix Square 11, 1000 Brussels

- Musical Instruments Museum (MIM) = Rue Montagne de la Cour 2, 1000 Bruxelles

- Maison Max Hallet = Avenue Louise 346, 1050 Brussels

- Maison Ciamberlani = Rue Defacqz 48, 1050 Brussels

- Place Saint Boniface = several Art Nouveau buildings

I was lucky enough to visit some of the Horta houses in October 2011 when they were opened to the public. I can see a Horta house from my window since I'm lucky to live close to one of them. The trail by walk or by bike is really worth it!

Visited only the House and atelier - this is site is absolutely beautiful. One of the best I have seen!

Would be great if other Houses could be accessible for public too (Stocklet house included!)

These four houses are some of the finest city residences in Europe, and in my view the finest works of the Art Nouveau movement. The main problem is that the incredible interiors are mostly out of bounds for mere mortals. The exception is Musée Horta, which is my ‘Must See’ sight in Brussels. It is a fairly small museum but the incredible detail of design can be seen on every surface, even the most functional aspects of the interior, such as the door handles have been laboured over. The canopy at the top of the staircase is incredible.

Though they may look twee and escapist the buildings were actually at the forefront of technological advancement, using iron as the frame of the buildings and actually exposing it, as it was a revolutionary technique at the time.

Of the façades that can be seen Hotel Van Eetvelde is perhaps the finest, Hotel Solvay has some great details the ornament of the door and the numbers are great. Hotel Tassel from the outside looks pretty uninspiring, however inside lies perhaps the finest piece of Horta’s work, the mosaic floor and painted walls of the staircase are sublime. On two occasions I have even chosen to stand outside having a cup of coffee in the hope that the owner would walk by, take pity on me and allow me a quick glimpse, needless to say this has never happened.

There are many great Art Nouveau buildings in Brussels, my favourite is the Old …