Kasteel Lippens

Lokeren, Belgium, Belgium

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Kasteel Lippens is a 19th‑century neoclassical country house in the former municipality of Moerbeke, now part of the city of Lokeren in East Flanders, Belgium, located at Lindenplaats 7/7A and Plaisantstraat 2.

It was built in 1879 on the initiative of Auguste Lippens, a long‑serving burgomaster of Moerbeke, together with his sister Stéphanie Lippens and her husband Hippolyte de Kerchove Lippens, as a substantial two‑storey, nine‑bay brick‑and‑stone mansion with a mansard roof, strong vertical articulation through pilasters and risalites, and a well‑proportioned central portico giving it a formal, French‑influenced appearance.

The estate includes a symmetrically arranged park, a former lodge (conciërgerie) next to the mansion, and a U‑shaped ensemble of service buildings (coachhouse, stables and horseman’s house) built at the same time, with a distinctive polygonal turret over the horseman’s residence and historic ironwork and stabling details.

In 1974 the municipality of Moerbeke bought the domain, restored the buildings, and in 1977 opened the castle as the new town hall, replacing the old one; after Moerbeke merged with Lokeren in 2025, the building continued as a service centre for residents while remaining known locally as “Kasteel Lippens,” and it is now a protected monument embedded in a public walking park that also features a monument to Madame H. de Kerchove d’Exaerde‑Lippens erected in 1911.