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"The Espace Léopold (French, commonly used in English) or Leopoldruimte (help·info) (Dutch) is the complex of parliament buildings in Brussels (Belgium) housing the European Parliament, a legislative chamber of the European Union (EU).
It consists of a number of buildings, primarily the oldest, the Paul-Henri Spaak building, which houses the debating chamber and the President's offices, and the Altiero Spinelli building which is the largest. The buildings are located in the European quarter in the east of Brussels, with building starting in 1989.
The complex is not the official seat of Parliament, which is the Immeuble Louise Weiss in Strasbourg, France, but as most of the other institutions of the European Union are in Brussels, Parliament built the Brussels complex to be closer to their activities. A majority of the Parliament's work is now geared to its Brussels site, but it is legally bound to keep Strasbourg as its official home...
Due to the failure of leaders to agree on a single seat, the Parliament desired full infrastructure in both Brussels and Strasbourg, where the parliament's official seat is located. In Brussels an international congress centre (unofficially intended as the Parliament) was built with the backing of the Generale Maatschappij/Société Générale and BACOB who joined forces on the project in 1987. The project was built on an old brewery and marshalling yard including the covering of the Luxembourg railway station to form a pedestrian area. The building project started before 1988 with building work on the hemicycle and the north wing starting in 1989 and the south wing in 1992.
The policy committees, inter-parliamentary delegations and the political groups all meet in the complex. Consequently the secretariat of the committees (DG IPOL and DG EXPO) and the political groups are all situated there as well. Construction on the Spinelli building started in 1991 and was competed in 1997 while the last phase of extensions (Antall and Brandt), towards Luxembourg Square along rue de Trierstraat, was completed during 2008.
Following the completion of Antall and Brandt, it is believed the complex now provides enough space for Parliament for the next ten to fifteen years with no major new building projects foreseen. Three quarters of Parliamentary activity now take place in Espace Léopold, rather than Strasbourg.
In 2008, the final extensions to the complex were completed along the Trierstraat and Luxembourg Square. Originally called the D4 and D5 buildings, there was controversy as to who to name them after. At the death of Pope John Paul II, Polish MEPs tried to get the new buildings named after him, though this was opposed on grounds of secular government and that he did not contribute to the Parliament. Václav Havel, Nelson Mandela, Olof Palme, Margaret Thatcher and Jan Palach were all suggested by MEPs, with one satirical suggestion was naming the two buildings the "Kaczynski Towers" after the Polish brothers Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the first the late former president and the latter formerly Prime Minister (2006–07), who enjoy a frosty relationship with Brussels. In January 2008 the bureau reached a final decision. The new buildings were named after Willy Brandt, the German chancellor from 1969 to 1974, and József Antall, the first elected Hungarian prime minister from 1990 to 1993. The bridge connecting the new building to the original structure was named the Konrad Adenauer bridge. Konrad Adenauer was the German chancellor from 1949 to 1963. Meanwhile, the parliament's press room was named after the assassinated Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya."