At least during normal times this building is used for different kinds of events, but of course right now for obvious reasons no conferences, events or parties are able to take place.
At the time of my first post-lockdown visit to Planckendael, on May 23rd (the report of which this image concludes) restaurants still had to be closed by law. As a result Planckendael could at the time only offer visitors take-away foods and drinks, to be eaten elsewhere in the park as the terraces around the restaurants were also still closed or empty of furniture.
In June the restaurants at zoos were allowed to reopen, but with social distancing and safety measures in order. When the restaurant reopened part of the conference building and part of the surrounding outdoor event area were used to enlarge the surface of the restaurant and terrace areas.
During the summer mandatory registration of restaurant patrons for contact tracing purposes was also legally implemented. As a result the current method is that visitors have to register with their name and contact information upon entry to the restaurant and are assigned a suitable table for their group size, to ensure that social distancing and limited capacity are maintained.
Currently to ensure social distancing between arriving and leaving visitors the route for leaving visitors runs over a part of the event area between the conference building and Planckendael's smallest parking lot, hence why I was able to get this picture, as this area is not normally open to regular visitors. The smallest parking lot is currently only in use for disabled visitors and staff, while normal visitors have to use the large parking lot, connected to Planckendael via a tunnel under a major road.
