Venue: Royal Flemish Theatre
Address: Lakensestraat 171 - 177, 1000 Brussel
Town: Brussels, BE

The Royal Flemish Theatre (Dutch: Koninklijke Vlaamse Schouwburg, abbreviated KVS; French: Théâtre royal flamand) is a theatre in central Brussels, Belgium. It is the anchor of the Flemish theatre company in Brussels, which aims to promote professional theatre in the Dutch language in Belgium and abroad. A place is also made for dance, poetry, music and temporary exhibitions. The theatre is located in the Quays or Sainte-Catherine/Sint-Katelijne Quarter, where the inner port of the City of Brussels was located until the end of the 19th century. Its main façade is located on the Rue de Laeken/Lakensestraat. It is served by the metro stations Yser/IJzer (on lines 2 and 6) and Sainte-Catherine/Sint-Katelijne (on lines 1 and 5). From the middle of the 19th century, there was a desire to establish a permanent Flemish theatre company in Brussels. In 1852, the Tooneel der Volksbeschouwing-Brussels' foremost Dutch-language company-was founded. This led the city authorities to reassign the former Brussels Arsenal in the Quays or Sainte-Catherine/Sint-Katelijne Quarter to that destination, a project negotiated since 1860. This building, originally a warehouse designed by the architect Remi Nivoy and erected between 1779 and 1781, stood at the end of an old dock, dug in 1639 as part of the Port of Brussels, at the eastern end of the Quai au Foin/Hooikaai and the Quai aux Pierres de Taille/Arduinkaai. In 1883, the city's then-mayor, Charles Buls, commissioned the architect and decorator Jean Baes to design the new theatre. Baes created a new façade in neo-Flemish Renaissance style on the Rue de Laeken/Lakensestraat, whilst retaining the arsenal's old façade as the rear of the building. The final plans were approved in 1884, work began the same year and the inauguration took place on 13 October 1887. At the solemn opening by King Leopold II, the Belgian monarch spoke Dutch publicly for the first time. A significant gesture, by which the king acknowledged and honoured the decades