Simone Guilissen

Simone Guilissen-Hoa (7 March 1916, Beijing - 30 May 1996, Brussels) was a Belgian architect, one of the first women to practice architecture in the country. After the Second World War she participated in the renovation of residential properties, designing many Modernist houses which blended into the local style, making use of similar materials.

Biography

Born in Beijing, her father was a Chinese engineer, her mother a Pole. After completing her schooling in Brussels, she studied architecture at La Cambre, graduating in 1938. She began her internship with Charles Van Nueten but completed it in Zurich with Alfred Roth. In 1937, she married Jean Guilissen. Although she left him before the war, she continued to use his name. During the Second World War, as a member of the resistance he was shot, while she was deported to Ravensbrück concentration camp and later to the AGFA Commando, a satellite of the Dachau concentration camp.

In 1947, she resumed her activity, participating in reconstruction assignments. For a few years she worked in partnership with Jacques Dupuis (1952–1956). In 1957, she completed one of her most notable projects, La Quinta, a large villa in La Roche which she designed with separate functional areas. In 1947, she received a major commission for the sports centre in Jambes but it was not completed until the early 1960s. She also completed a provincial institute for the blind with Jean Dupuis in 1953.^[1] In the early 1970s, she participated in the development of Louvain-la-Neuve completing a student residence complex. In 1980, she completed the Maison de la Culture in Tournai in collaboration with Ginion, Pirson, Winance.

References

This article draws heavily on the Dutch Wikipedia article nl:Simone Guilissen