On her first visit, 15 years ago, to the abandoned school complex that was to become her family home, Veva van Sloun was in for a surprise. Located in a busy area of Ghent, the old school was shielded from the main street by bamboo planting. Beyond white gate she discovered it had a hidden courtyard garden, not to mention its own chapel. The site was much bigger than she anticipated. “It was so dilapidated that when I leant against the wall some of the bricks crumbled and fell off,” she recalls.
Undeterred, she decided to take on the renovation. The chapel had been extended to house the school kitchen and gymnasium. These elements were removed to restore the chapel as a separate entity, giving van Sloun, her husband, Jan, and their children more space. “We had to take off the roof and rebuild it brick by brick because it was in a horrible condition,” she says. “I didn’t know enough about what I was getting into when I bought it – especially the costs of modernisation.”
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