Early history

The Square Sainctelette, named after Belgian minister for public works Charles-Xavier Sainctelette (1825–1898), was constructed in 1911 together with the Quai du Commerce/Handelskaai, the Boulevard de Dixmude/Diksmuidelaan, the Boulevard d'Ypres/Ieperlaan and the Place de l'Yser/Ijzerplein. The district, called the Quays or Maritime Quarter, was known for its wholesale shops, fruit and vegetable auctions and market halls. These were active until the 1970s. At the end of the 1960s, there was an increase in Mediterranean wholesalers.

The square is surrounded by apartment buildings in Art Deco and Haussmann-esque style. The Citroën garage was built in the early 1930s in modernist style. Next to the Citroën garage is the Kaaitheater, a theatre built in Art Deco and modernist styles that was known as the Lunatheater in the early 1930s.

Below the square is Sainctelette metro station, which has never been opened.

21st century

The Square Sainctelette has a mixture of residential and office buildings, with culture represented by the Kaaitheater and Citroën garage, which has been converted into the KANAL - Centre Pompidou museum of modern and contemporary art. As a traffic axis, the square, located in the north-western corner of Brussels' Pentagon (French: Pentagone, Dutch: Vijfhoek), is part of the Small Ring (Brussels' inner ring road).

In 2019, the square was voted the most dangerous intersection in Brussels in an online poll carried out by the Dutch-language Brussels broadcaster BRUZZ.^[1] In the same year, plans were completed for a drastic redesign of the square.^[2] At the beginning of 2022, an application was made to transform the square into a contiguous space with the Place de l'Yser.^[3]

On 16 October 2023, an intersection and building just off the square were the scene of a terrorist attack in which two Swedish football supporters were killed by a gunman and a third injured.^[4]

• 
  Sainctelette Bridge
• 
  Kaaitheater
• 
  KANAL - Centre Pompidou