Major Mining Sites of Wallonia
The four sites of the property form a strip 170 km
long by 3–15 km wide, crossing Belgium from east to west, consisting of
the best-preserved 19th- and 20th-century coal-mining sites of the
country. It features examples of the utopian architecture from the early
periods of the industrial era in Europe within a highly integrated,
industrial and urban ensemble, notably the Grand-Hornu colliery and
workers’ city designed by Bruno Renard in the first half of the 19th
century. Bois-du-Luc includes numerous buildings erected from 1838 to
1909 and one of Europe’s oldest collieries dating back to the late 17th
century. While Wallonia had hundreds of collieries, most have lost their
infrastructure, while the four components of the listed site retain a
high measure of integrity.