of Orange-Nassau, on the site of today's Palace of Charles of Lorraine. In 1769, the idea germinated to clear and level the ruins of the Place des Bailles and to convert it into an esplanade intended for military parades. The plan was on the verge of completion in 1772, when another project rendered it obsolete. Clearance and development It was only in 1774 that Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine, Governor of the Austrian Netherlands, proposed replacing the ruins with a monumental royal square inspired by French models such as the Place Stanislas in Nancy (1755) and the Place Royale in Reims (1759), of which it is almost an exact replica. The project was approved that same year by Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, who authorised the demolition. If at the beginning, this space, intended to be decorated with a statue of the governor, was sometimes called the ("Lorraine Square") in his honour, it is finally the name ("Royal Square") which was retained, according to the predominant model in France, which appeared more suitable to represent political power. Construction of the new buildings around the square took from 1775 to 1782, using the neoclassical design of the French architects Jean-Benoît-Vincent Barré, who drafted the basic project, and Gilles-Barnabé Guimard, who received that commission in 1769 and who carried out the detailed plans. The first draft of the project, designed by the engineers-architects Louis-Joseph Baudour and had planned to keep the Gothic chapel of the former palace, which had been spared by the fire. Due to the architectural clash with the surrounding neoclassical buildings, however, it was pulled down. This plan was modified around 1780 by the Austrian landscape architect , who imagined connecting the square to the new Palace of Charles of Lorraine and Brussels Park (housing a statue of Empress Maria Theresa, which was never carried out). The new district, known today as the Royal Quarter, and designed on a structure connecting these three strategic points, also aimed to relieve congestion in this part of the city. The former statue of Charles Alexander of Lorraine, which stood at the centre of the square, was made by the Flemish sculptor and architect Peter Anton von Verschaffelt. It showed the governor standing, dressed as a Roman general draped in a consular mantle, attending to the affairs of state. French revolutionaries toppled the statue when they entered Brussels in January 1793. Replaced during