A historic waterfront property in the Belgian port city of Ghent will welcome guests for the first time on 1 September. Named 1898 Porter’s House, the refurbished building sits among the city’s canals and medieval towers, its pale stone facade, tall arched windows and heavy double wooden doors offering passers-by a glimpse of Gothic revival architecture given a luxurious update.
Guests can book a single room or suite, or reserve the entire property for a group of up to ten. The interiors, designed by Geraldine Dohogne, preserve soaring ceilings, original doors and intact fireplaces, set off by marble, aged wood, antique writing desks and vintage mirrors sourced from around Belgium. The hotel takes its name from its former role as the porter house of the nearby Hotel des Postes et des Telegraphes.
Accommodation ranges from the cosy Porter’s Room, with warm wooden floors, a marble bathroom, a double vanity and twin rain showers, to more expansive options. The Porter’s Room can connect to the Porter’s Junior Suite for a two-bedroom stay, while the Porter’s Graslei Suite and Porter’s Family Suite add lofty terraces overlooking the Graslei quay on the east bank of the River Leie, a riverside stretch popular with locals and visitors for dining and taking in the city reflected in the water. Inside, a space named The Kitchen serves breakfast and afternoon tea with freshly baked pastries and artisanal breads.
The opening is also an invitation to explore a city its tourist office describes as “a cultural cocktail on a human scale.” Ghent’s cobbled streets hide plenty for the curious traveller, chief among them the Castle of the Counts, the only remaining medieval castle in Flanders with its moat and defences largely intact, whose history reaches back to the Roman era. Today, audio tours feature a comic retelling of the castle’s story by the Flemish comedian Wouter Deprez.
There is no shortage of museums either, from Kina: House, where children explore the world of plants and animals, to the Museum of Fine Arts, the country’s oldest, with a collection spanning the Middle Ages to the 20th century. Food lovers, meanwhile, can book a table at Publiek, a one-Michelin-starred bistro serving lunches such as chicken leg with kohlrabi and multi-course dinners built around quail, mackerel and hake.
