Which tourist villages surround Chez Clément?

The Genval / La Hulpe corner of Walloon Brabant is one of the most concentrated village clusters in Belgium. Within a fifteen-minute radius of Chez Clément you have six tourist villages of complementary identities: Genval (lakeside ornamental village), La Hulpe (Solvay parkland), Lasne (rural Walloon Brabant), Rixensart (the administrative commune of Chez Clément itself, with its own château), and on the Flemish side, Hoeilaart (Sonian Forest (Forêt de Soignes) gateway) and Overijse (Druivenstreek wine country).

The brasserie's location on the Genval / La Hulpe border, ten metres from the communal line, makes it the natural pivot point of this micro-region. Many visitors discover the area through one village (often Genval for the lake or La Hulpe for the Solvay estate) and then use Chez Clément as the lunch or dinner anchor for further exploration. The house has played that role for five generations, since Henri and Sidonie Clément opened the “Bruyère à la Croix” coaching inn in 1858 at the carrefour of the routes to Wavre, Brussels, Charleroi and Namur.

An unusual feature of this micro-region: it straddles the linguistic border. Genval, La Hulpe, Lasne and Rixensart are French-speaking Walloon villages; Hoeilaart and Overijse are Dutch-speaking Flemish villages of the Druivenstreek. The transition is invisible on the ground, ten metres of road, sometimes, but it gives the area an unusually rich cultural depth. Chez Clément, on the French-speaking side but visible from the Dutch-speaking villages, attracts visitors of both linguistic communities equally.

For a one-day itinerary, the typical loop is: morning walk in the Sonian Forest from the Hoeilaart side, mid-morning coffee in La Hulpe village, late-morning visit to the Folon Foundation, lunch at Chez Clément, afternoon loop of Lac de Genval, late-afternoon detour through Lasne for the countryside drive.