Juliaan Lampens

For the second edition of Unfolding the Archives, the Flanders Architecture Institute draws on the oeuvre of Juliaan Lampens (1926-2019). Based on a selection of unique archive pieces, the exhibition offers an unprecedented insight into this architect’s working method.

The Lampens archive

The non-profit organisation vzw Juliaan Lampens, which manages Juliaan Lampens’ archive, is currently hard at work cataloguing, digitising and unlocking its contents. It contains a wide variety of pieces, including design sketches, composition sketches, exploratory drawings and architectural plans for both completed and unbuilt projects, and full-scale architectural details. These working documents demonstrate the importance that Lampens attached to the craft of drawing and materialisation. In his long career as a teacher and professor at Sint-Lucas in Ghent, he inspired several generations of architects. For this exhibition, we therefore invite some of his pupils to make a selection from his legacy.

The Architectural Detail

The thematic selection illustrates Lampens’ fascination with architectural detail. This plays a pivotal role throughout his oeuvre. Design sketches, exploratory drawings and architectural plans reveal how the development of the detail has a vital impact on the creative process of his architecture, from embryonic idea to completion.