Kasteel Ten Poele

Bruges, Belgium, Belgium

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Kasteel Ten Poele is a historic manor house and moated estate in the Sint‑Pieters‑op‑den‑Dijk district of Bruges, Belgium, located at Vaartstraat 51 close to the canal and the Bruges–Ostende railway line.

The name “Ten Poele” refers to the family of Jan van de Poele, first recorded as owner in 1365, and the estate was long the most important feudal holding of the Sint‑Pieters parish; over the centuries it belonged to prominent families such as de Houdecoutre, Rapaert de Gras and others before passing out of the Rapaert de Gras hands in 1989, having been in their possession since 1733.

The present building is essentially an 18th‑century classical manor with ground floor and upper floor, seven bays and a rectangular plan, set within a moat and accessed via a bridge; earlier 16th‑ and 17th‑century structures were largely replaced by the family Rapaert de Gras, and in the 19th and 20th centuries extensions were added, some of which were removed and the castle restored in 1967–1968, with a new wing in neo‑style inserted at that time.

In front of the bridge stand stables built in 1896 and in the surrounding park there is an ice house and a small eclectic belvedere or gloriette, possibly erected shortly after the First World War as a viewing tower allowing the castle residents to survey the part of their estate on the other side of the railway line, while the western part of the domain is now a public park used for walking and recreation.