Castle Van Horst

Holsbeek, Belgium, Belgium

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Castle Van Horst (Kasteel van Horst) is a picturesque water castle in the village of Sint‑Pieters‑Rode, part of the municipality of Holsbeek in Flemish Brabant, Belgium, situated in the green valley of the Wingebeek among the rolling hills of the Hageland region.

The site was first mentioned in written sources in 1434, but the oldest archaeological traces date from the 12th century; the castle’s most distinctive feature is its robust square residential tower (woontoren) from the 15th century, which still stands as it did in the time of the fictional “Rode Ridder” (Red Knight), whose home base in the comic books by Willy Vandersteen was deliberately set on this real castle.

In the 17th century, the noble owner Maria‑Anna Van den Tympel substantially renewed the interior, adding a chapel and a coach house and creating grand reception rooms with elaborate stucco work by the famous Flemish sculptor Jan‑Christiaan Hansche, turning the castle into a fashionable “pleasure house” for the Leuven nobility and a centre for hunting parties, and after this period it was largely left untouched, so that much of its 15th‑ and 17th‑century character survived.