D'Ursel Castle

Bornem, Belgium, Belgium

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D'Ursel Castle, also called Kasteel d'Ursel or Kasteel van Hingene, is a neoclassical country house in Hingene, a village in the municipality of Bornem, province of Antwerp, Belgium, about 30 kilometres east of Antwerp.

For nearly four centuries, from the early 17th century until 1960, the estate served as the summer residence of the ducal d'Ursel family, who used it as a retreat from their main townhouse in Brussels, arriving each year between May and October with their entire household.

The origins of the building go back to the mid‑16th century, when it was a large house owned by Thibault Barradot; later owners such as Diederik van de Werve added a new wing and a tower, and in 1608 the estate was bought by Conrad III Schetz, who took the name of his aunt Barbara d'Ursel, after which the d'Ursel family lived there until the mid‑20th century. 

For much of the 18th and 19th centuries the castle was refurbished in a French neoclassical style, with ochre‑yellow façades, a symmetrical plan and a park laid out in the late‑19th/early‑20th‑century landscape manner, and it was regarded as one of the most elegant ducal palaces in the region. After the family left, the castle stood empty for about twenty years; in 1994 it was bought by the Province of Antwerp, which carried out a careful restoration and opened.