The building is located in the south of the city centre, it consists of six wings of courts and offices that radiate out from a public reception area, called the
salle des pas perdus (). The entrance to the building is via a large staircase on ground level from the Bolivarplaats () rising over tram lines and onto the
salle des pas perdus. Bolivarplaats is a large public
town square. The most public areas of the building are the
salle des pas perdus along with offices courtrooms close it. The more secure areas being further away, that are not accessible to the general public. The building has 1 underground and 5 above-ground floors, with two underground parking garages for staff. Offices are on 3 floors in each of the six wings. The contract to design the building was awarded to the
Richard Rogers Partnership in association with
Arup and VK Studio offices who proposed "an efficient, subtle and transparent building with a powerful symbolic image" with a "respect for the human scale". They were designed to represent sails of ships, both past and present passing by on the river
Scheldt. The larger courtrooms each have the tallest sail roofs (dimensions 9 x 9 x 7.3 meters (L x W x H)), The trees were planted in the spring of 2006. ==Awards==