Belair, meadowland that ended up named after a villa

Belair is a place to live rather than to visit, and the city sums it up as residential, close to Merl park and full of playgrounds. But walk through it and there are three stories I’d tell anyone, a house that named the district, a tower that leans and a statue hidden under a grandstand.

From buttercup meadows to a French-sounding suburb

Before the building boom of the 1950s, only cows grazed here, says the tourist office. The old name, Duvenvelt or Daubenfeldt, came from a buttercup-like plant of meadow and marsh, and survives in the Dauwelswee, the street from Boulevard Grande-Duchesse Charlotte to Merl cemetery. In 1887 the area was called Neu-Merl and had 87 inhabitants.

Today’s name comes from the architect Mathias Martin’s house at 97 Avenue Gaston Diderich, which bore «Maison Bel Air 1923» on its front. It passed to the street and, in 1956, to the whole district. In the front garden stand two statues, Mercury, for trade and industry, and Venus.

What is there to see?

St Pius X church, opened in 1957, has a 69-metre tower that leans slightly. To keep it stable, the great bell was hung lower down. Before the opening, residents wrote their dreams and wishes on slips of paper that now rest in the golden sphere at the top.

Nearby are the Villa Leclerc, at number 54 on the same avenue, and the Franciscan convent of 1919-1921. Place de France, 4,854 m², gathers shops and restaurants, and Merl park starts at the district’s edge. I cover it in Merl. To the north, Rollingergrund, which the city counts as Belair-Nord, reaches as far as the Bambësch woods.

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The Gëlle Fra’s hiding place

Belair’s best-known building is the Josy Barthel, the former national stadium. Under its stands, in 1981, the golden statue from the Monument of Remembrance turned up, hidden there to save it from the Nazis. Restored, it went back to Place de la Constitution in 1985, and for me it’s the best tale in the district, a plain sports ground that once hid the country’s best-known symbol. The full story is in Gëlle Fra.

Getting there

Belair begins a few minutes’ walk from the Luxembourg old town, between Route d’Arlon to the north, Route de Longwy to the south and Avenue Guillaume. City buses run through it and, like all public transport in the country, they’re free. I’d walk, heading on to Merl park, and give the district an hour at most, enough for the leaning tower of St Pius X, a look at Maison Bel Air and a coffee on Place de France.

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