Curtius Palace: A Patrician Residence and Museum Building in Liège
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.4
- Popularity
- Medium
- Country
- Belgium
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Elite Residence
On this page9 sections
History
Construction and Curtius ownership
Curtius Palace is a patrician residence in Liège, Belgium, built around the turn of the seventeenth century for Jean De Corte, the industrialist, merchant, munitions contractor, treasurer, and military supplier better known by his Latinized name, Curtius. Its construction took place in the Féronstrée and Hors-Château district, on land that Curtius purchased for 3,000 florins from the former claustral territory of the Collegiate Church of Saint Bartholomew.
The residence acquired its palatial name because contemporaries were impressed by its size. Philippe de Hurges visited it in 1615 and left a valuable description. Curtius departed for Spain in 1616, leaving the property to his son Pierre, who neglected its upkeep. In 1627, Pierre sold the palace to the mont-de-piété, a public pawnbroking institution that provided loans against pledged goods. The sale brought 29,000 florins and an annual rent of 636 florins. Jean Curtius died in Spain on 12 July 1628.
Division and institutional use
In 1628, the property was divided into two nearly equal plots. The mont-de-piété occupied the section facing the quay and added a storey to the porch. During the revolutionary upheavals, the institution was dismantled in 1812. The deteriorated palace then passed to the civil hospices, and extensive work made the building habitable again in 1818.
Transformation into a museum
With assistance from the Liège Archaeological Institute, the building passed to the City of Liège in 1901. The city installed its archaeological collections there and later added collections of decorative arts. Major restoration continued until the museum opened in 1909, with the principal restoration campaign taking place between 1904 and 1909.
Curtius Palace is now part of the Grand Curtius museum complex. It was protected as a monument on 14 January 1950 and designated exceptional heritage of Wallonia. Cleaning of the façade and porch took place in 1980 and 1981. In summer 2003, pigment analysis supported the reconstruction of the mascarons’ polychromy, the regilding of the dormer finials, and the restoration of the cornice’s probably original green colour. The 1997 Megamuseum project, which sought to unite the district’s museums, provoked controversy because archaeologists feared for the historic buildings and their collections.
Remains
Main façades and plan
Curtius Palace is a civil building in the regional Mosan tradition of the Meuse valley, with features associated more specifically with the Louis XIV style. Brick and limestone form its rectangular plan, while a porch is attached to the southern part of the lateral façade. Four façades rise through four storeys of decreasing height. Stone chainwork frames and divides the elevations, and the quoined jambs use alternating projecting and recessed blocks. A relatively high base consists of large masonry blocks.
The windows vary in the number of their lights and include stone transoms and mullions. Between the rows of windows, brick panels carry cartouche mascarons, carved ornamental faces and figures in tuffeau relief. Their subjects include human and animal forms, the arms of the Curtius family, religious scenes, Greek fables associated with the recently published fables of Phaedrus, and medieval fabliaux. Metal anchor heads mark the ends of the tie rods.
West tower and roof
A four-storey tower rises above the central bay on the west side. Its masonry matches the façades, and two volutes flank its base. The tower interrupts the cornice and is crowned by a balustrade enclosing a broad terrace. The building has a high slate roof with hipped ends and sprocketed eaves, formed by projecting sloping pieces that carry the roof beyond the walls. On the south side, eleven hipped dormers with finials diminish in size toward the ends to form a triangular composition, while the east side follows a similar arrangement. A chimney made from materials matching the façade walls stands beside the upper dormer. Roof ridges, weather vanes, and finials were gilded.
Porches and entrances
The west porch opens onto the inner courtyard and carries an extra storey built in a manner resembling the palace façades. Its arched gateway rests on projecting stops and uses one-in-two rustication, in which alternating stone blocks project from the surface. A decorated entablature crowns the entrance. Small square windows flank the gateway, while a bretèche, a projecting defensive or semi-defensive structure above an entrance, is set above it within quoined chainwork.
Two doors in the east and west lateral façades gave access to the palace itself. The courtyard could be entered through the porch or through two entrances of identical appearance, one on Féronstrée and the other on the present Rue du Mont-de-Piété, formerly Rue de la Sirène.
Alterations and conservation
The east façade was substantially changed shortly before the middle of the eighteenth century. Its original wide ground-floor openings were replaced by accesses to underground services. Eighteenth-century windows inserted into the north façade were replaced during the twentieth-century restoration by mullioned openings resembling the earlier forms.
Before the museum opened, some foundations were underpinned, and the cross walls running from the ground floor to the second floor were rebuilt and tied together. The vaulting of the tower was removed and reconstructed with reused original materials, while the fireplaces were repaired. The ground-floor wall painting and the two first-floor fireplaces dated 1604 remain among the protected elements of the building. Stone blocks were raised and positioned with a lifting device known as a goat and pincers, and traces probably produced by that construction process can still be seen on the palace.
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