Pillar I:
Ecological transition in the field of culture

Priority 10:
Having specialists to carry out public policy objectives on sustainable culture

Brussels is home to many office buildings built during the city’s post-war tertiary boom which are now vacant as they no longer match contemporary workplace standards.  

Rather than treating demolition as the default path to modernisation, the region’s Bouwmeester/Maître Architecte (BMA), together with regional heritage and planning institutions, is now recognising this “young heritage” as part of Brussels’ cultural legacy.  

Instead of opting for demolition, the Department of Cultural Heritage within urban.brussels is creating an inventory of post-war and postmodern architecture. The BMA has also set up Projectlines, a new tool providing an urban planning framework for redevelopment projects, defining objectives on functional mix, density, public space and sustainability.  

The project’s impact is already palpable. Of office spaces above 5,000 m2 reviewed between 2019 and 2024 (1.4 million m2 in total), 55% will be fully transformed rather than demolished, with 44% of that becoming housing. Building on this momentum, the BMA is now proposing a regulatory reform that would make preservation and transformation the norm, and demolition the justified exception.