In 1931, when its founders had completed their studies, the contents of L’Equerre broke away from the Academy of Fine Arts. The publication of foundational texts and reflections on questions of town and regional development intensified. The main trends of current developments in architecture at a local, European and global level were analysed to the benefit of a commitment to an innovative architecture and a radical critique of Liège architecture. ‘They constantly complained that Liège remained behind in relation to modern trends in architecture.’ Little by little the group’s members weaved themselves a network, not only with the main modern Belgian architects (Victor Bourgeois, Louis-Herman De Koninck, etc.), but very quickly with the international world as well and in particular with the CIAM (International Congresses of Modern Architecture), where all the theorists of the modern movement came together (Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, etc.). In 1935, the members of L’Equerre became CIAM secretaries for Belgium, putting themselves in the front line in relation to this international movement. Numerous ideas mobilized at CIAM congresses were reproduced and interpreted in L’Equerre, a genuine propaganda magazine for the modern movement on a national level.

Progressively, whilst the review gained in maturity, its founders themselves began to work as architects. From 1935 they together created an architecture and town development agency in Liège, also called L’Equerre. The review then set about tackling more technical subjects. Thematic dossiers, linked to their reflections on the terrain, found their place in the periodical’s pages. ‘They for example established a study into the links architecture and town planning could foster with childhood, whilst they were working on producing a play area at Coronmeuse. They also carried out a study into the question of tenement housing whilst at the same time they were working on projects for housing for workers.’ The review did not restrict itself to architecture but analysed not only social questions but contemporary artistic developments, opening its columns to the painting of Fernand Steven, the sculpture of Idel Ianchelevici or the poetry of Georges Linze.

From 1936 the dissident group drew closer to power and its architectural output gained in importance. Jean Moutschen, a member of L’Equerre, was named Director of the City of Liège’s Architecture Service. During the same period Georges Truffaut became the Deputy Mayor of the Public Works Department and entrusted L’Equerre with major Liège urban projects. The militant architects thus carried out significant public and social housing works in the Liège basin.

A break with Liègeois architecture

Whilst in Liège an historically inspired architecture dominated, L’Equerre embodied the ideas of modernity, advocating a minimalist and functionalist style. Shorn of decorations, the architectural line supported by the architecture and town development agency played on the volumes and used industrial materials at cheap prices. Bang in the middle of the housing crisis the CIAM, for which L’Equerre was an intermediary, offered a ‘Minimum house’, at a fair price and without embellishments, breaking with the luxurious and bourgeois art deco and Fine Arts architecture which prevailed in the 1920s. This Minimum house also claimed itself as a response to the modern world, the spaces designed in particular having to facilitate a woman’s work in managing the household.