— Project intent
A precise answer to the site and programme.
The conversion of this rural farmstead in Thorembais-Saint-Trond, in Walloon Brabant, gives a new collective residential purpose to a heritage ensemble characteristic of Walloon agricultural architecture, defined by its fired-brick volumes, steeply pitched slate roofs and courtyard-centred organisation. Rather than treating each building in isolation, the approach developed by architecture firm STARC considers the ensemble as a whole, preserving the legibility of its heritage while meeting the requirements of contemporary housing.
The conversion strategy is tailored to the specific nature and scale of each existing structure. The former stables are converted into four dwellings, the two existing units in the main farmhouse are brought into planning compliance, and the storage building is transformed into two or three additional homes. The barn, whose programme is yet to be defined, completes the ensemble. Original openings, the rhythm of existing fenestration and the brick materiality are treated as constitutive constraints that inform the interior design rather than elements to be corrected or concealed.
The courtyard, previously a purely mineral transitional space, becomes the heart of the project. Its requalification as a shared communal space articulates the various dwellings and establishes a carefully managed porosity between private and collective life. The landscaping of the surroundings extends this logic through a considered integration into the village fabric, embracing the traces of time as an essential part of the character of the place.
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