In Belgium, A Building Shaped Like A Whale

By Dorothy Tan, 08 Jan 2013

Architectural firm L’Escaut—in collaboration with BE Weinand—has constructed a building that looks like a whale in the Belgian city of Liége.

Housing a ice-skating rink, the distinctive whale-shaped building is not what the architects initially planned—it took its curious shape by chance.

The shape of the gigantic sea mammal emerged after the architects tried to work within the inherited constraints of the building site.

“At the root of the project: a round, fluid and generous shape, as a metaphor of a universe of ice. As its construction progressed: a sea monster, a whale covered with 200,000 aluminum scales.”

To add to the marine theme, the building also features a succession of portholes and is plated with shiny aluminium scales.