As a part of the urban assemblages studio that consists on the making of a transect starting from Scharbeek formation to Woluwe Saint Lambert in order to analyse, decompose and develop urban territories in brussels, we concentrated our work on the Hof Ter Musschen protected zone that is situated in Woluwe Saint Lambert in the south of the flemish border. It’s surrounded by the Saint Luc hospital campus andBoulevard de la Woluwe.

1. Discovery:

As a first interaction and visit to the site in question we identified the different existing functions, for instance, the hospital campus, metro Alma station, a residence zone and the Hof Ter Musschen green zone that has an old windmill and a renovated old farm that we could see from the transect line but couldn’t have access to.

2. Rediscovery:

After digging deeper and with more inquiry, we discovered that Hof Ter Musschen is actually a protected,managed and animated zone by the CEBE non-profit association (commission de l’environnement de Bruxelles et environs asbl), which explains the restricted access to it and the lack of  connections  between  the existing urban fabrics around it, which makes it a sort of obstacle.

3. Problematics
The previous phases lead us to identify problematics regarding the analyzed site. The high protection of Hof Ter Musschen makes it a buffer that can’t absorb any urban function nor connect between the already existing ones, like the Alma metro station on the east side of the site that remains isolated from the residencyzone on the west side of it, implying that the inhabitants have to cross a much longer distance, same goes forthe connection to the hospital campus and the rest of the neighborhood.

4. Interventions
In order to respond to the identified problematics, our project aims to find a middle ground between the protection of the natural site and its opening to the transect line and its surroundings. Hence, we settled forfour main interventions:

• Preservation of historical heritage: We maintained the already existing windmill, farm house and
• Opening pathways: The process consists of tracing the paths as a first step, then analyzing the site’s flora and fauna and also the human experience to be able to merge all of these settings and create a certain cohabitation between the We created three green pathways, each one following different sequence to offer a unique experience to the space user. The firstpathway connects the hospital

campus to Marcel Thiry Avenue leading to Brussels center where we propose a cohabitation sequence that offers artificial bird nests on top of the covered structure that is also elevated to not disturb the birds flight that happens to be on a low height, and a socializing sequence that takes advantage of the organic shape of the flexible benches to create social interactionsbetween people while negotiating space. The second path connects the Alma metro station to the residency zone on the west side of Hof Ter Musschen where we offer animal friendly urbandesigns like the wooden structure path shaped in a wavy way that creates cavities for birdsreproduction and also playing areas open to all age ranges, this path continues towards the gardening sequence that encourages the visitors to take care of the local flora through themanual modulability of the wooden panels that protects the flora from the sun/shade accordingto its needs and conditions.

The third path is extended from the north to the south of Hof Ter Musschen, parallel to Boulevard de la Woluwe, that aims to open up the green site to this mainstreet, while inviting the walker to the green promenade that follows the same logic as theprevious ones.

• Enlarging the green: we eliminated the Mounier Avenue and created a new one between theTangla hotel and the hospital campus in order to have a bigger green zone that isn’t interruptedwith
• Attaching a program: in order to connect the  hospital  campus services to the Hof Ter Musschen zone, and provide a better recovery for the patients in the hospital, knowing that the majority of the rooms there have a view to the parking lots which is not very pleasant, wedecided to convert the old farmhouse Vaden Bossche into a recovery and recreation The concept is to create  an  in between space to open up to nature and  to  provide  natural  light using a glass structure, that continues to the backyard and creates activitybubbles encouraging both socializing or privacy. The experience of this center starts from the first volume that includes a reception area leading to recovery rooms and a cafeteria, then wecontinue towards the second volume that goes from a physical experience  including warm  up,  massaging and  cooling down  areas to a spiritual experience including the meditationroom.