A 100-year-old villa on the Belgian coast comes to market with a new look

Belgian architect Valentin Vaerwyck cemented his career designing monuments and landmarks, so when commissioned to build a holiday home for the modernist landscape painter Albert Saverys, he folded in elements of both. Villa Sous Tous Vent in Zoute, a few moments from Knokke’s wild coastline, has height, proportion, decorative corbels, charming bas reliefs and broad windows that offer panoramic views over one of Knokke’s most beautiful parks.

Those windows were crucial in opening the interiors to gentle North Sea light, so this could always be a place where domesticity and creativity overlap. And so it remains today, 100 years after Saverys first moved in. Thomas Verschuren and Ann Butaye, founders of Belgian design collective Maison Osaïn, have completed a full restoration and reimagining of the heritage home, maintaining its intrinsic elegance and warmth while opening it up to a more contemporary rhythm.

Their objective, per Osaïn’s mandate, was to bring the historic features into line with current market demands and sell a fully furnished turnkey residence. Yet it’s clear the labour was one of all-consuming love. The rooms are enveloped in richly veined marble, porous mineral surfaces, tactile ceramic tile and custom wood accents — all of the highest spec, from the double-height minimalist kitchen to the spa-like bathrooms tucked into the eaves. In subtle ways the nuanced palette honours Saverys’s aesthetic sensibility and reverence for light.

To help decorate, Verschuren and Butaye went so far as to call on consultants from the Tuscan art collective Kalpa, who came armed with work by Eleanor Herbosch, Sabine Pagliarulo and others. And to tame the sloping gardens they commissioned the region’s venerable landscape designer Piet Oudolf. Using native flora and characteristic restraint, he brought biodiversity to borders, colourful interest to the lawns and calmness to contemplative corners overlooked by the home’s multiple terraces — and the refurbished swimming pool, a later addition to the original house. Oudolf’s composition shifts with the seasons, very much alive year-round.

While the couple hunt for a buyer, they’ve opened the villa as a location for photographic shoots. But as the weather warms, the garden flourishes in and the beach beckons, it may not be long before the right family comes knocking.