The Louise

In the centre of Brussels, along the prestigious Avenue Louise, the German fund Patrizia has commissioned CIT Blaton to carry out a thorough renovation of the 24 floors of The Louise tower, which stands at 90 metres high. The work includes renovating the façades and technical installations, as well as refurbishing the office space in the base and tower. The aim of the renovation is to bring the tower into line with new standards of comfort and energy efficiency, while respecting the original architecture.

The project is designed on the basis of BREEAM certification criteria, with an emphasis on sustainability and low environmental footprint construction techniques. Energy consumption will be greatly reduced thanks to the new ventilation system, high-performance double glazing and efficient cooling system in the ceiling.

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The Louise Tower, pure modernity
After almost three years of work, Project Director Eric Cantillon's team put the finishing touches to the final details before officially closing the Louise Tower in Brussels on 6 May. Let's take a look back at the highlights of this project.

‘We completely dismantled the building, leaving only the basic framework.

A process in reverse

The Louise ©CIT Blaton

As Eric explained, all that was left was the building's skeleton: the interior of the Louise Tower and the facades were demolished from A to Z. But contrary to what might have been expected, our colleagues worked from Z to A. In fact, they first demolished the upper floors and then the lower ones, and also rebuilt the building from top to bottom, rather than from bottom to top as usual. Why did they do this? To get rid of all the waste without damaging the newly renovated floors. An ingenious strategy, to say the least!

Challenges met with flying colours

A project - and a major one at that - always brings its share of challenges. Here, the main difficulty was none other than logistics. The building is located in the centre of town and is surrounded by housing, which considerably complicated the delivery of materials and the disposal of waste.

In addition, the streets are very close to the building. Safety was therefore a key concern, as nothing could fall to the ground and injure passers-by.

Our crack team also had to deal with another major challenge: the building is not a listed building, but it is listed as a heritage site. So the façades had to be rebuilt identically. To achieve this, our colleagues reproduced the old profiles down to the last millimetre and used the same type of glazing - albeit with much better thermal insulation - to achieve the same appearance as the original. A bespoke job done by the book!

A green building

As the client had opted for a carbon-neutral building, the original plans were modified to remove all but one of the boilers and replace them with a large, much more environmentally-friendly heat pump. The Tour Louise also features green roofs and photovoltaic panels.

Given that this choice of a sustainable building was made after the start of the works, our colleagues were granted a deadline extension. As a result, the site was handed over in May 2024 instead of September 2023, as originally planned.

The Louise in figures

At 90 metres high, the Tour Louise has a surface area of 28,500 m² above ground and 24 floors - if you can call them that, because as in any insurance or bank building, the 13th floor doesn't exist, superstition obliges! The tower also has two annexes of four and six storeys respectively. To top it all off, there are three basements containing car parking, cycle parking, technical rooms and cloakrooms, totalling 9,880 m².

As a large quantity of concrete was poured on site, there were few prefabricated elements on this site: 280 columns and beams and 1,662 m² of hourdis. With the exception of the staircases! Since they were all replaced, no fewer than 328 prefabricated elements were transported to build the new staircases.

What's next?

The keys to the Louise Tower have been handed over to Solar, which belongs to the Patrizia Group, a German investment fund. The aim? To let the building to businesses. Patrizia is mainly targeting law firms, consultancies and banks, among others, as the building is located a stone's throw from the courthouse on Avenue Louise.

The staff occupying the premises benefit from cutting-edge technology that allows them to manage the building, zone by zone. They can adjust the level of light and heating in their own area, and raise and lower the blinds, all from an application on their smartphone. Practical, isn't it?

Click here and fly around the tower!