Francis Maere, as Busy as a Bee

You are set up in Ooidonk, a charming Flemish country village, but also decided to open a branch in central Ghent six years ago – why? Setting up in Ooidonk in 1995 was a gamble. It's a delightful place: a real picture postcard in the Flemish countryside, with its shoreline leading to the château. This idyllic image has brought plenty of strollers and antiques lovers to my door, particularly at weekends. I'm not the only one to have made this choice: Guy Pieters and Oscar De Vos also have galleries in nearby villages. It's rather a Belgian speciality, all these galleries springing up in the countryside. But attitudes are changing, like buying habits, and it was high time to return to the city in search of a new, more international clientele with higher standing. So I took over the rooms on the first floor of a Baroque palace in central Ghent: the Hôtel Falligan, an 18th…