Gaston Eysselinck
The reasonable expectations (and reciprocating joys) of a vulnerable house: If you listen
“Let’s have a look” started it all.
Twenty years ago, Joris Verdoodt and Gino Bulcke were not yet looking to buy a house, but they had already imagined a list of what a future house should have. So, when a listing for a mid-century home by Gaston Eysselinck, an important Belgian architect (and local to Gent), caught their notice, they were curious.
By the time they had finished their visit to the two-story brick house on a corner in a near-suburb of Gent—and with their wishlist completely unfulfilled—they both recognized that the house had “something different, a real character”. They knew, Joris and Gino simultaneously agree, “This has to be our house.”
Built in 1939 and empty for 10 years, the house needed considerable care. But with assurance from an architect friend that “the structure is really good; you can make it beautiful again”, they were encouraged and, “Suddenly it was our house!” So began several years of significant restoration and, one might say, tender behavior modification.
In the decade since it “suddenly” became their house and their project, the Gaston Eysselinck house has revealed the character they noticed on the first day. Joris articulates, “There’s always something very natural and simple about his houses…a very intelligent architect…all those small ingredients that are always typical of him but there are no affects, very simple and well-thought-out.”
