User:Ferguut/De Studio

De Studio is an historic building located on Mechelseplein in Antwerp, which today serves as an art house. Originally built as an aristocratic city palace, it later became a hotel, a bank, and an acting school (Studio Herman Teirlinck). The building, located in Antwerp's bustling theater district, has been operated since 2011 by art house De Studio, which transformed it into a cultural hotspot.

Art house
De Studio provides a dynamic meeting place for a young audience (0 to 30 years old), where they come into contact with art, culture, and media. The art house emphasizes the urban and social context, with special attention to the vulnerable position of young people and artists. The original location of the art center Villanella, the predecessor of De Studio, was located in the same building. The art house is organized to transform from theater hall to party club to art hall to conference space. De Studio acts as a platform where young people are given space to share their stories. Various theater companies, creators, players, curators, and artists find a stage here to turn bold dreams into non-ordinary creations.

The building also houses De Cinema, born of the collaboration between the M HKA and De Studio. The film program includes not only masterpieces of film history, but also highlights the relevant cinema of today and the classics of tomorrow.

City palace
The area around Rue Marshal Gérard had been built up for some time, but the building history of De Studio itself dates back to 1780, when Baron François-Joseph van Ertborn had his city palace built there. He belonged to the wealthy family of bankers and lawyers, van Ertborn and was married to Jeanne van de Werve who had inherited the original building. She was the daughter of Count Charles Philippe van de Werve and Marie-Anne de Prêt. François-Joseph of Ertborn had a city palace built there according to the latest fashion. Because of stylistic features and van Ertborn's ties to freemasonry, one suspects that the then palace was a creation of the French neoclassical architect Barnabé Guimard.

The building in its present form still exhibits many elements typical of a neoclassical city palace such as the carriage gate with reception hall on the bell floor and the spacious garden. It originally contained two salons, the first of which overlooked Mechelseplein and the second the garden. The latter is the still to be admired in its original form and has a rotunda with richly elaborate decoration consisting of Corinthian columns, parquet, marble mantelpieces, mirrors and supraportes, among others. The whole is a good example of style à la grecque or style à l'antique.

Bank
In 1820, the hotel of Ertborn was purchased by Petrus-Jospeh de Caters, director of the Antwerp bank C.J.M. de Wolf and for a time mayor of Berchem, to serve as the bank's residence and headquarters. In 1882, because of financial problems, the bank was transformed into the limited liability company Société Anonyme Banque de Wolf, but it continued to use the building.

Hotel
On the occasion of the 1885 World's Fair, Antwerp was expecting many wealthy visitors. Since there was a lack of luxury hotels at the time, the Caters' descendants decided to set up a hotel in the wing still owned by the family under the Société Anonyme du Grand Hôtel d'Anvers. They had the wing converted into a luxury hotel by the architect Eugène-Emile Esnault-Pelterie. His additions included side wings with a winter garden, a reading room, billiard room, exhibition hall, party room, and a pediment inscribed Grand Hôtel. During World War I, the hotel was requisitioned by the German occupiers as lodging for senior officers. After the end of the war in 1919, the building was bought by the Banque de Crédit Commercial, and the salons were transformed into a richly decorated counter room with a mosaic floor and cellars were excavated for a vaulted room. The wrought ironwork in front of the windows of the façade with the bank's initials also dates from that time.

Studio Herman Teirlinck
In 1970, the Studio Herman Teirlinck was housed in the building. In 1995, 16 schools merged to form Hogeschool Antwerpen, and in 2002 the acting course of Studio Herman Teirlinck merged with that of the conservatory under the direction of Dora van der Groen. In 2011, the Province of Antwerp bought the building from Artesis Hogeschool and donated it to Villanella on a long lease.