Antwerp is famous for becoming the northern hub of European trade around the turn of the sixteenth century. This international status went hand in hand with ambitious urban explansion plans, only some of which could be realized, and by around 1700 the city had contracted again inside its walls. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the port revived and industrialization brought renewed growth. New docks were built, the city centre was modernized, and the suburbs were integrated into the ...