Het Steen

A visitor center inside Antwerp’s oldest building, made of stories, people, and places.

Visit Antwerp, Antwerp (BE), 2021

Parent and child closely examining the drawers of a historic wooden cabinet in a red-patterned room at Het Steen, discovering tactile and visual elements of Antwerp’s past.

Overview

Het Steen Visitor Center, located in the oldest building in Antwerp, is the city’s main visitor center, serving as a gateway for international and local audiences. Visitors explore the historic fortress along an 11-room path, discovering diverse neighborhoods, iconic landmarks, and expressions of the city’s vibrant culture.

The experience combines digital media, interactive installations, and spatial storytelling to introduce Antwerp’s history, identity, and contemporary culture. Through immersive and accessible interpretation, visitors are invited to explore the city’s past and present while orienting themselves within the broader urban context.

  • Female visitor touching a vertical touchscreen display embedded in a large cabinet structure, revealing layered stories through artworks and animated content.
  • Distant view of an immersive theatrical installation, with a woman seated in the foreground watching life-sized projections of actors in costume performing inside a recreated artist’s studio.
  • Child seated among oversized wooden architectural models, gazing up in awe at a screen embedded in the wooden structure above.
  • Woman looking up inside a vertical wooden structure with a digital ceiling screen displaying a kaleidoscopic architectural animation.
  • Child interacting with a large touchscreen display embedded in a wooden exhibit structure, surrounded by architectural models and warm lighting.

Contribution

I led the UX/UI and multimedia design of the visitor experience, translating the visual approach into a variety of interactive experiences, audiovisual installations elements, 360° projections, and immersive installations.

My role included defining a coherent visual and interaction system connecting screens, projections, and spatial touchpoints, ensuring clarity, consistency, and orientation across the visitor journey.

I coordinated internal and external teams across design, content, and production, working within the operational constraints of the COVID-19 period. Navigating remote collaboration, shifting timelines, and on-site limitations strengthened my ability to adapt workflows and ensure continuity and quality under non-standard conditions.

  • Woman exploring a room lined with life-size vertical screens, each presenting cultural stories and visuals from different neighborhoods of Antwerp.
  • Woman using a large horizontal touchscreen map alongside a wooden scale model of Antwerp, in a sunlit room with tall windows.
  • Woman and child inside an immersive panoramic projection room with floor-to-ceiling visuals of a car terminal and cargo ship.
  • Woman and child engaging with a large interactive map table; both smiling and pointing to different elements on the digital surface in a warmly lit room.

Key achievements

  • Led UX/UI and multimedia design for a city-scale visitor center experience.
  • Built a coherent visual and interaction system across digital and spatial touchpoints.
  • Translated historical and cultural content into accessible, engaging experiences.
  • Coordinated multidisciplinary teams across design, content, and production.
  • Delivered the project under COVID-19 constraints while maintaining quality and continuity.
  • Woman interacting with a horizontal touchscreen exhibit focused on craftsmanship and local industry, featuring large visuals and text in a softly lit space.
  • Woman standing in a dimly lit attic space, listening to an audio track through a handset while interacting with a touchscreen display embedded in a wooden podium.
  • Two women and a child observing a large vertical digital display showing a high-resolution reproduction of a classical painting, inside a bright gallery space with tall windows.
  • A child sits on the floor while a woman stands nearby, both immersed in an interactive installation where colorful visuals and texts about Antwerp’s creative industry are projected onto the floor and wall.

Credits

Role: Art Director | Lead Designer
Employer: Studio Louter
Client: Visit Antwerp
Photography: Ocular

© All rights reserved to Studio Louter

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Close-up of a woman gazing at a large colonial painting depicting a noblewoman with children. The woman stands in a dark gallery lit by focused spotlights on the artworks.

Awarded

Shifting Image

Mauritshuis, The Hague (NL)