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Belgian Guy Documents Ugly Houses He Sees And They’re So Bad, It’s Hilarious (30 New Pics)
We can’t get enough of Ugly Belgian Houses! They’re bizarre. They sometimes hurt to look at. They’re so unique and so far from boring that we can’t help but love them… and love to hate them.
The brainchild of Hannes Coudenys, the Ugly Belgian Houses project has been going strong for years. Hannes documents some of the most peculiar examples of genuinely Belgian architecture that might make your inner designer wince and facepalm. Below, you’ll find the latest crop of (arguably) ugly houses.
Pssst, Pandas, we know how much you love bizarre architecture. So when you’re done enjoying this architecturally interesting article and upvoting the houses you thought were the worst of the bunch, you should definitely check out Bored Panda’s previous lists about Ugly Belgian Houses here: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.
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One Of Mozes' Less Famous Miracles
Luke, I Am Your House
Well, It Does Have A Cupholder
Currently, Ugly Belgian Houses has a whopping 161k followers on Instagram, as well as an additional 120k+ fans on Facebook. And these folks can’t wait for the latest architectural disasters to challenge their understanding of good and bad taste.
Hannes, the founder of the project, has published a book about Ugly Belgian Houses, does vlogging on the side on YouTube, and even has his own creative digital studio, Hurae.
All The Single Windows, All The Single Windows
Someone needs to tell them the window tax ended a long time ago.
Slide 🎶 To The Left
But…but..the roof-door…I just… I … *internal screaming takes over*
🎵 Our Street In The Middle Of Our House 🎵
Earlier, the founder of the project spoke to Bored Panda about the Instagram page, beauty, and how some homeowners can get very angry when their properties get featured.
“I have been visiting a lot of the houses and had some really nice conversations,” Hannes told Bored Panda earlier.
At Least The Neighbors Have A C View
Inception
Car Wars
“Meanwhile I am working on a second edition of the book, so I have to call all the owners again. I’ve just had a call with two people who hate me and don’t want their house in my book. I can understand that,” he opened up to us.
You Don't Need A Flag. We All Know This Is Belgium
Belgians Need To Stop Thinking The Box Needs To Be Outside
Let’s Meet The Pharaoh
According to the Belgian, the success of his project is due to “the fact that we all have a certain opinion on what makes a house beautiful. Or ugly. And the fact that these opinions are only opinions.”
Meanwhile, he pointed out that a lot of Belgians also agree that they have a lot of ugly houses in the country. It’s not a unique perspective to have there. However, Hannes firmly believes that it is better to have an ugly house than a boring one.
I Can’t Wait To See The Result 💀
Brick-A-Baraque
Meltdown
“In Belgium, you have a lot of suburbs and housing projects that all look the same and are in fact very boring. Something you see in Holland as well. I prefer ugly than these boring creatures,” he suggested that calling a house ‘ugly’ is almost a subtle compliment.
Is This The Submarine?
You Seem To Have Misplaced Your Balcony
Clap Along If You Feel Like A Room Without A Room
In his opinion, a typical ugly house in Belgium has “its own quirky uniqueness” such as having “a special roof, a special stone, a special decoration.” He added: “We want to express ourselves via our house.”
Hannes joked that his beloved project has turned into a kind of a cult. “We all love to hate ugly Belgian houses,” he told us. However, Belgium is far from the only place that has errrr unique architecture. “Poland has terrible architecture, as a lot of people have let me see,” he shared his insights.
When They Tell You You Can Use The Back Door
When U Need A Ladder To Look Outside Your Window
If You’re Happy And You Know Like This House
It doesn’t mean that Belgium only has disturbingly quirky houses, though. Hannes thinks there’s a lot of good there, too. “I like the work of Gijs van Vaerenbergh, Vens-Vanbelle, De Vylder Vinck Taillieu, Vincent van Duysen,” he said.
When You Wipe Your Architecture Too Hard
There are a few buildings in belgium like this. I don't know why they like this look so much. That and nickelodeon green slime green for their kids rooms
Home Sweet Gnome
Lord Of The Cringe: The Two Towers
"Normally, if you like architecture you like good houses, but in Belgium, there’s a lot of ugly architecture. So I started taking pictures of it,” he opened up about the roots of the Ugly Belgian Houses project.
"Because regulations are quite liberal and we love to design our own quirky dreamhouse," the founder of the page said. And some homeowners are so proud of the designs, they’re willing to fight Hannes tooth and nail.
Good Morning Vietnam! I Mean 🇧🇪 Belgium!
Why Would You Want A Window When You Can Have A Door?
“I received emails from lawyers and eventually gave in, stopping the blog altogether. I can understand the negative reactions in a way... It's the house of their dreams and I am demolishing it!" he told Bored Panda.
Check The Houses On The Other Side
I wouldn’t call this ugly. 🤷♀️ Out of place and not in keeping with the rest of the neighborhood sure, but it’s not ugly.
Spain 🇪🇸 In The Ass
That's 100m from my house. Changed owner already 5 times since 2003. Does have swimming pool.
Squid Playing Games With My House
Art Imitating Life
The Worst Of Both Worlds
We Have Options
Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Who's The Ugliest Of Them All?
I Think We Reached Peak Ugly Belgian Houses 😳
When Your Entrance Is Swollen
You Had One Job
I Do Mind The Gap
Computer Says No
Ding Dong
Berlingo & Juliet
Out Of The Box
Go Belgium 🇧🇪 🙈❤️😀
Insane In The Spain
A Part Of Me Feels Empty
So This Is The House That God Built
The small "Kapelleke" (as the little thing in front is called in Belgium) is probably protected as cultural heritage. (They used to be all over the place, often near farmer's fields). The owner of the house would have gotten a really low price to buy the land behind it in exchange for doing the maintenance on it.
It’s Like Ugly Belgian Jesus Nailed To An Ugly Belgian House 😬
I see wall-e or some robot thingy leaning against the wall as though it’s trying to hide from something
Tower To The People
Who Erected This Building
Take A Bow (And Shoot Me)
Why Does My House, Feel So Bad 😢
Bric-A-Baraque
Grounded For Life
Aaaaaah Lasagnaaaaa
New Wave Of Uglybelgianhouses Coming
I pass by one of these on my way to work, except it’s in dark brick, has only one tiny visible window and no visible doors. Freaks me out!
Stay Outside The Box
Lord Of The Cringe
I'm starting to think that Belgium is really into turrets and towers...
The Grass Is Black On The Other Side.
Error & Try
It's an old store (butcher, baker or whatever) turned into a réguler house. The front facing is not finished. It'll look much more normal when done
Aroused House
Parthenon
When You Turn Your Castle Inside Out
Remember When Houses Still Had Floppy Disk Slots? Me Neither 🧐
Caption This
Is That An Antenna Or Are You Just Happy To Be Ugly? (Less Ugly Than The Building Next To It Though)
This Is My Church
Avant-Merde (Style Belge)
Think Outside The Parallelogram
2️⃣ More Days Until @uglybelgianhouses The Expo Opens At Ruby’s😍 — Opening Night This Thursday Febr 3 From 6pm, See You Soon! bv. De Dixmude 19, Brussels 📸 @kevinfaingnaert . . . #rubygallery #uglybelgianhouses #allaboutthings #allaboutarchitecture #belgianarchitecture #brussels
Party In The Front Business In The Back
If that is a dock door, it's awfully high for a truck bed to pull up to.
One Two Christmas Three
That’s When Good Neighbors Become Good Friends
Holds A Lot Of Magazines! 😬 #uglybelgianhouses
Tiny House Or Door To Another Dimension?
Architect With Tunnel Vision
🎵 The Roof, The Roof, The Roof Is Gone Bye Bye 🎵
Darkside Of The Room
Let’s Do This
Surely that's a store and not a house. Looks like they sell Belgian souvenirs, like the shirts in the windows.
Hodl
Is there something in the water in Belgium that makes them built butt ugly homes
There seems to be a lot of ugly, modern bricks in use there...
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I'm Belgian, and I swear that if it's true that this kind of houses is not uncommon, we also have a lot of boring regular homes, lol
As an American I believe you. Where I live there are some ridiculous looking buildings/ houses that would fit right in with these pictures but most houses are boring regular homes. Some of the almost brutalist looking architecture, though, I wish we had more of. Everybody hates it but I appreciate the ugliness lol
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How??? Belgium went from beautiful medieval buildings and splendid ArtDeco houses to this ???????? This must be a conspiracy...
Some parts of Belgium are horrible. Expensive overregulated cities. You think the salaries would match but people working in the lowest tiers of the work force, full time, make no savings. How can you live off 1600 where the minimum cost of living in this country has vmbecome 2400
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They have pretty rigid building codes, depending on the area. Size and orientation of windows, materials for walls and roof, maximum height under roof, maximum roof inclination... But it depends on the area (down to parcel lots). Believe it or not, my first project was rejected because the (top view) ratio length over width was 'disharmonious'. Just in case someone was shocked looking at it from Google maps. Old houses that aren't in regulated areas, well, rules are pretty lax.
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If this were a post about ugly American homes, people would be posting "why are you picking on me??? this is another anti-American post!!!". Where as the Belgian posts I see here say "ha, yeah this happens"
All Belgians here are just wondering when their house is finally gonna show up on one of these. :p
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the belgians have some strange, goofy ideas about everything! If you don't think so, ask for the opinion of belgians from any dutchman! The weirdest thing about belgians is that they sometime flavor their beers with strange stuff instead of the hops you expect to find in american beer... they sometimes even use blueberries! AAAaaaghhh!!!
Sure some of these are truly ugly. But many are just not to the taste of the OP. An art deco front, or juxtaposed roofs does not automatically mean ugly. Nor does an unusual house color. I do find the lack of windows disturbing. But mostly I think people's homes are theirs, and stylistic variation makes things interesting in life.
There was but that's a long time ago. We like privacy more, so we can run around naked and not be seen hahahaha
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I'm 50/50, a good majority of these were sooo f****n ugly and deserved to be on the list. But there was also a good majority that I found to be very nice and DIDN'T deserve to be on this list. Either way, great list nevertheless! 👌🏻 I'm gonna have to go check out parts 1 2 and 3 now xD
Is there something in the water in Belgium that makes them built butt ugly homes
There seems to be a lot of ugly, modern bricks in use there...
Load More Replies... I'm Belgian, and I swear that if it's true that this kind of houses is not uncommon, we also have a lot of boring regular homes, lol
As an American I believe you. Where I live there are some ridiculous looking buildings/ houses that would fit right in with these pictures but most houses are boring regular homes. Some of the almost brutalist looking architecture, though, I wish we had more of. Everybody hates it but I appreciate the ugliness lol
Load More Replies... How??? Belgium went from beautiful medieval buildings and splendid ArtDeco houses to this ???????? This must be a conspiracy...
Some parts of Belgium are horrible. Expensive overregulated cities. You think the salaries would match but people working in the lowest tiers of the work force, full time, make no savings. How can you live off 1600 where the minimum cost of living in this country has vmbecome 2400
Load More Replies... They have pretty rigid building codes, depending on the area. Size and orientation of windows, materials for walls and roof, maximum height under roof, maximum roof inclination... But it depends on the area (down to parcel lots). Believe it or not, my first project was rejected because the (top view) ratio length over width was 'disharmonious'. Just in case someone was shocked looking at it from Google maps. Old houses that aren't in regulated areas, well, rules are pretty lax.
Load More Replies... If this were a post about ugly American homes, people would be posting "why are you picking on me??? this is another anti-American post!!!". Where as the Belgian posts I see here say "ha, yeah this happens"
All Belgians here are just wondering when their house is finally gonna show up on one of these. :p
Load More Replies... the belgians have some strange, goofy ideas about everything! If you don't think so, ask for the opinion of belgians from any dutchman! The weirdest thing about belgians is that they sometime flavor their beers with strange stuff instead of the hops you expect to find in american beer... they sometimes even use blueberries! AAAaaaghhh!!!
Sure some of these are truly ugly. But many are just not to the taste of the OP. An art deco front, or juxtaposed roofs does not automatically mean ugly. Nor does an unusual house color. I do find the lack of windows disturbing. But mostly I think people's homes are theirs, and stylistic variation makes things interesting in life.
There was but that's a long time ago. We like privacy more, so we can run around naked and not be seen hahahaha
Load More Replies... I'm 50/50, a good majority of these were sooo f****n ugly and deserved to be on the list. But there was also a good majority that I found to be very nice and DIDN'T deserve to be on this list. Either way, great list nevertheless! 👌🏻 I'm gonna have to go check out parts 1 2 and 3 now xD
