HEAD OF THE QUAY | Kop van de Kaai

In many cultures and myths, the river symbolises the infinite flow of time.

The Memorial in the Magueriedok
The Margueriedok near the pilot station on the Scheldt quay in Antwerp is being converted into a memorial, a ritual place for commemoration and remembrance.
CorTen steel bowls in the dock are filled with water at high tide. When the tide recedes, a layer of water remains in the bowls, like “pieces of time”. The next tide takes the water from the bowls and carries it back to the sea.
The regular rhythm of the tide in the Margueriedok is metaphorical for the ritual nature of remembering and commemorating. The Margueriedok thus becomes an intimate tidal garden and a serene place. As a memorial, it is sufficiently secluded from the hustle and bustle of the park and the city to facilitate the launching of urns and other funerary uses, rituals and ceremonies.

The WWII Names Monument
The city of Antwerp is developing a Names Monument to commemorate the victims of the Second World War and pass on this memory to future generations.
Young people from Antwerp in the last two years of secondary education are actively involved in the Names Monument.
Each young person writes the name of one war victim in their own handwriting, and all the handwritten names together form the Names Monument: past and present literally “reach out to each other” here.

Water safety
The Memorial and the Names Monument form an integral part of a large-scale project on the Scheldt quays to make Antwerp resistant to flooding as a result of climate change in the future.