The architect Frans Smet-Verhas designed a striking Art Nouveau house in Antwerp’s Schilderstraat, just behind the newly-opened Museum of Fine Arts.
Built in 1901, it is known locally as Het Bootje, the Little Ship, because of the corner balcony shaped like a ship’s prow. The elaborate iron lamp under the balcony makes this house even more eccentric.
The house was built for an Antwerp ship builder called P. Roeis as one of four connected houses known, a little confusingly, as ‘The Five Continents’. To add to the confusion, one of the four houses was later demolished.
Derek Blyth’s hidden secret of the day: Derek Blyth is the author of the bestselling “The 500 Hidden Secrets of Belgium”. He picks out one of his favourite hidden secrets for The Brussels Times every day.
