Uitkerke Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Uitkerke Castle (Kerkstraat 420, Blankenberge) is a small rococo château dating from 1763, the work of the architect Berger, which the protection order describes as unique in the region. It stands on a motte, a relic of flood defences, partly surrounded by moats, and under the Ancien Régime it was the seat of the lordship of Uitkerke, first attested in 1270. The lordship passed to the Van Uitkerke family, then to the Claerhout family (1557), to Isabella de Zuniga y Fonseca (1636) and to the Croys, the last of whom held it from 1770 to 1794. Damaged by the men of Bruges in 1488–1491 and ruined on two occasions, the château was rebuilt in 1763; the banker Felix Sabot Dujardin bought it in 1846, and the surveyor Joannes Delcijn remodelled it in 1880, with extensions in 1929 and 1933. White façade with pilasters and pediment, rococo window surround, and a 1760s oak staircase in the Louis XV style; it has been a listed monument since 2003.