Belgium Black
Belgium Black

Maison & Maison allows you to design your own custom-made mantel out of luxury marbles such as Black Belgian marble. Our mantels are fully customized through the customer being able to choose their own marble. 

Black Belgian marble features a solid black color, which was very popular for making mantels. A good example is the mantel in the Hercules Salon at the Chateau des Comtes de Marchin in Modave, a scultpting masterpiece, carved out of Black Belgian marble. The antique mantel in the kitchen of the hotel Groesbeeck Cross in Namur is also carved out of Black Belgium marble and dates back to 1605.
Finally, eight of the nine mantels from the sixteenth century Château de Cadillac in Gironde have Black Belgian marble elements.

This name refers to several black marbles quarried in Belgium. Black Belgium quarries are in the Hainault region and near Namur in Belgium. Free from veins, it is a rare marble of extraordinary quality with an incomparable polish. The marble was quarried in the region of Tournai from as early on as the eleventh century. It is often referred to "Tournai marble" and was widely used in churches in Belgium. In the twelfth century, the marble was also exported to England. The baptismal font in the cathedral of Winchester, the tombstone of the Abbot at Westminster Abbey and the monument of Bishop Roger of Salisbury Cathedral, are all made out of this marble and date back to the twelfth century. 

Another quarry north-west of Namur has been producing a marble called "Golzinne marble " since the nineteenth century. It is considered the purest of all black Belgian marbles. It is a favorite for precious hard stone marquetry.

At the end of the 19th century, this marble was used a lot, alongside Carrara marble, for chequered flooring in public places. 

It is an easily breakable marble, making it very difficult to work with. It is mainly used for baptismal fronts and ecclesiastical monulents, floors, sculptures, furnitures, clocks, and for the Florentine Pietra Dura.