To see the work of great 17th-century painter Paul Rubens, you need to go to the Rubens Hall in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp where his masterpiece Adoration of the Magi hangs alongside other works that speak to his amazing range and empathy. To understand who he was, though, you need to visit the far smaller Rubenshuis and its gardens nearby, recently given a new entrance building – one could think of it as a gatehouse to the Flemish artist's world – by the Antwerp-based architecture practice Robbrecht en Daem.
The cultural space houses an introduction to Rubens’ life, in the basement, a double-height public reception area on the ground floor, and a library, as well as offices on floors three, four and five.
