Place du Luxembourg

No middle-class district could be without a railway station. The Gare du Luxembourg (Gustave Saintenoy, 1853), towards which the eye is led as you look down Rue du Luxembourg, provided a fast rail link with the centre of Brussels, and with Namur and Luxembourg. The train was just as important for the affluent classes at that time as the company car is today. The architect Trappeniers (1858) designed a particularly harmonious square in front of the station whose simplicity gives it added impact. It remains the centrepoint of the Leopold Quarter to this day. Initially it was used only by the wealthy residents (and their staff), but when they relocated to pastures new and their townhouses were turned into offices, Belgian commuters and, later, Eurocrats took over. The latter like to socialise at ‘Place Lux’.

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