Sint-Bertinuskerk, Gothic church in Poperinge, Belgium

Sint-Bertinuskerk is a late Gothic hall church of yellow brick with a heavy west tower in Poperinge. The tower has four levels, stepped corner buttresses and pinnacles, and a stair turret in its south wall. The nave has five bays, and the west portal is carved in white stone with a statue of Saint Bertin.

A chapel dedicated to Saint Catherine was replaced in 1147 by a Romanesque church. Fire damaged it in 1419, and English troops fighting Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy burned it again in 1436. The present late Gothic brick hall church was probably built afterwards, in the second and third quarters of the 15th century.

The pulpit, carved in 1710, came from the Dominican monastery in Bruges and was bought by the churchwardens from a Bruges carpenter in the early 19th century; during the First World War it was kept safe in Paris. In the portal, parishioners still pin up notices of deaths, a custom kept in only a few Belgian places.

The west portal on Kerkstraat gives the clearest view of the tower and its stepped corner buttresses. The south aisle has stood largely free since annexes were demolished in 1969, and the north aisle opens onto the Donkergat. The tower was only finished in the 18th century, when the bells were hung.

In the church porch, parishioners still pin up notices of deaths, a custom now kept in only a few places in Belgium. The church is also the oldest parish church in Poperinge's centre, built in brick Gothic style like the coastal region around it.