Coastal Architecture - Belgium

Todays blog is written on a plane between Paris and Dubai at the end of a 11 day summer break in Belgium. Yes, I'm flying as a passenger, so please no panic.

As most of the time, I did travel with part of my photography gear, my thrusty Nikon D700 camera body, Nikkor 14-24mm 2.8 wide-angle and 24-70mm 2.8 lenses & the Canon G9 Compact camera.

During our stay in the land of beer and chocolate, we visited part of Beaufort 03, an open-air art exhibition consisting of contemporary installations along the 66 km Belgian coastline.

Personally I found the windsock installation of Daniel Buren, "Le Vent souffle ou il veut" on the beach of De Haan, one of the more interesting ones.

I'm not a big fan of the Architectural potpourri at the Belgian seaside, but managed to get some reasonable shots.

This Belle Époque house in Westende stands majestically overlooking the North Sea.

Just a few hundred meters further to the West, we found this 1955 lookout on one of the highest dunes in the area, The "Spioenkop".

Even though the Pavilion dates back to 1902, it was rebuilt twice, after both World Wars (1922 & 1955).

Before heading inland again, we stopped for a drink at the Fort Napoleon, Oostende, one of the last remaining Forts from Napoleonic times (1811-1815). The restoration took five years (1995-2000).

Beside a museum the Fort offers an excellent restaurant with a beautiful terrace.

This newly built piece attached to the old fort makes an interesting Architectural combination.

I'll be back with a few more Belgian Architectural blogposts in the coming days...

Happy Shooting,

Bjorn