Belgium · Flanders · Antwerp
Kievitwijk, Antwerp — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Kievitwijk is the unofficial name of a district behind Antwerp Central Station, which developed from about 1845 after the Provinciestraat was laid out.
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Where to stay in Kievitwijk
Where visitors usually base themselves, and why.
The station is the front and the back at once. Kievitwijk lies behind Antwerp Central Station, which is why people used to describe it as being behind the zoo for want of any other name. Four things bound it.
Roughly it runs along both sides of the Lange Kievitstraat between the Provinciestraat, the Plantin en Moretuslei, the Antwerp Zoo and the railway toward the Netherlands. The name itself is young.
Things to do in and around Antwerp
Ranked by global recognition; descriptions from Wikidata (CC0).
Museums & Galleries
8- Museum Plantin-Moretus UNESCO
- Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal Heritage
- Het Steen Heritage
- Rubenshuis Heritage
- Museum Mayer van den Bergh Heritage
Show 3 more →
- Red Star Line Museum Heritage
- Vleeshuis Heritage
- Snijders&Rockox House Heritage
Churches & Religious Sites
4- Carolus Borromeuskerk Heritage
- St. James' Church, Antwerp Heritage
- St. Paul's Church Heritage
- St. Andrew's Church, Antwerp Heritage
worth knowingacross 2 categories in and around Antwerp
About Kievitwijk
What are the main landmarks in Kievitwijk?
The name came out of a building dispute. Kievitwijk is only a few years old and arose during the large works at the Kievitplein and the protest against them, and it caught on at once because the people living there had no name for their own neighbourhood. Flowers grew here first.
At the start of the 19th century the area held flower fields, greenhouses and a few wooden buildings laid out by the botanist Charles Van Geert. He moved on after the zoo was built. Van Geert continued his work at the Arboretum Kalmthout.
What is the history of Kievitwijk?
Fortification rules kept it empty. The area lay within the field of fire of the Antwerp ramparts, so nothing could be built there, and it was crossed only by field paths at the edge of the Potvliet. Flowers filled the gap.
At the beginning of the 19th century it held flower fields, greenhouses and a few wooden structures put up by the botanist Charles Van Geert, who later continued at the Arboretum Kalmthout after the Antwerp Zoo was laid out. The Brialmont works released it. After that line of defence was built the neighbourhood developed from about 1845 through the laying out of the Provinciestraat.
Its name is the most recent thing about it. Kievitwijk arose during the works at the Kievitplein and the protest against them, and it stuck because nobody living there had a name to offer instead.
Where is Kievitwijk?
Kievitwijk lies behind Antwerp Central Station along both sides of the Lange Kievitstraat, between the Provinciestraat, the Plantin en Moretuslei, the Antwerp Zoo and the railway toward the Netherlands.
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Updated October 2026