The I Love Belgium team went to Paris Fashion Week (menswear) last weekend and again we were smitten with Cedric Jacquemyn‘s new Fall Winter 2012 collection Fields of Regeneration, a continuation of the previous collections The Last Glacier and The Waste Land. Read the rest of this entry »
In the city of Mons we can find Belgians finest example of contemporary theatre architecture. With a small budget architect Pierre Hebbelinck transformed a run-down military riding stables into a transparent cultural hub.
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Tanguy Ottomer is known as ‘the guide’ of Antwerp, or more often referred to as the ‘beroepsantwerpenaar’ (=Antwerp native by profession). Tanguy is a man with a self-invented job, in a way you can call him a designer, as it is his ambition to design guided tours. Read the rest of this entry »
Brunel Mintona is a 24 years old, young up and coming Belgian fashion designer with Congolese roots (so Belgium runs in his DNA!). After studying fashion at Bichoffsheimm and at the Saint-Luc Institute, he worked as an intern for pin-up favourite Madmoiselle Jean and has been fashion editor Benoit Béthume‘s assistant for the past two years. Read the rest of this entry »
Photographer Fien Muller has a way of telling stories in still lifes. Whether she creates a striking “tableaux” with carefully arranged frozen fish or colourful scrap material, it’s always a feast for the eyes! To recognize her still lifes you need two ingredients: a white background with hanging/leaning/piling objects. Read the rest of this entry »
Water Towers, there are tons of them here in Belgium… but you surprisingly hardly notice them. Probably because these huge water collectors are built in isolated places. You know, someone actually converted this giant container into a home. Who in their right mind could conceive of such an idea? Apparently someone with a great passion for water towers… Read the rest of this entry »
Mirror mirror on the wall… who is the fairest mirror of them all? We were wondering ourselves, so we decided to put 5 Belgian designed/made mirrors together. Picking a favourite is not our thing, so it’s up to you to reply “the … mirror is the fairest of them all.” To make it difficult we decided to take 5 different design styles, sizes and ideas. So be ready to reflect! Read the rest of this entry »
The fashion weeks presenting the new Fall Winter 2012 collections have started and the fashion pack is moving from one fashion capital to another. If you still have to figure what do have to wear this Summer, the I Love Belgium team summed up the Spring Summer 2012 trends for you. Read the rest of this entry »
It isn’t since the 1997 Pop Mart U2-tour, when Walter Van Beirendonck designed the costumes (Bono’s muscle-tee is still engraved in our memory), that Belgian avant-garde fashion is so present in the international music scene!
We don’t have the beautiful building uniformity of Paris, the smart town-planning of London or the museum-like quality of Amsterdam. What Brussels does have is a crazy mix of 19th century brick town houses with concrete mid-century office blocks. And it’s the latter that has a bad reputation in Brussels. As a consequence of the Brussels world exposition of 1958, Belgians capital fell victim to genuine construction fever. Driven by great optimism, architects went in search of a renewed modern style, enriched by transparency, poetry or colour. Read the rest of this entry »
The LGBT community loves Belgium, but unfortunately it doesn’t always love them back. Most of the time even for no reason at all. Although the term gay bashing certainly does not require any explanation within the LGBT community, the concept is completely alien to all too many outsiders. Read the rest of this entry »
Yes, television is also culture. So we feel obliged to talk about the Belgian success story of “Benidorm Bastards”. This hidden camera show follows 7 senior citizens whose mission is to roam the streets and blow the minds of young people. This translates into vulgar talk, hip hop moves and juvenile group behaviour from seventy-seven olds! Not really the behaviour you’d expect from the “good old days’ generation. Read the rest of this entry »
In between the many art galleries in the hood ‘het Zuid’ in Antwerp, you can find the young boutique ‘Studio Twee’ (meaning two). For Lotte De Mey and Nathalie Perneel, one was not enough to hold a boutique. These two talented jewelry designers put their heads together for this new studio. Read the rest of this entry »
A building plot near Bruges, surrounded by a protected beech forest. 
A wet dream for most architects, if it wasn’t for the fact that the plot was only 30 meters wide and 75 meters long. For architecture office Govaert & Vanhoutte this was only an advantage. Read the rest of this entry »
For the last few years Jules Wabbes (1919-1974) was high-up there on the vintage list for international design dealers. As a result his original designs reached astronomical heights in price and desirability. That’s why the premier representative of Belgian design in the 1960s and 70s is currently re-edited by Belgian design-house Bulo, lightning house Wever & Ducré and carpet house Bic-Carpets. Read the rest of this entry »
The menswear fashion weeks have kicked off. First everybody was in Florence for the Pitti Uomo and now the fashion pack gathered in Milan. There has been a lot of buzz concerning the Prada show because it would be a star studded one. Read the rest of this entry »
A good rule for Sunday afternoons? Be cultural! That’s why we urge you to visit À St Médard. This Brussels based Complex Center of Art is having a weekend dedicated to paper and those who work it. After the I Love Belgium team popped in yesterday, we we’re impressed with the intricate scissor work and wanted to share the love. We’ve picked out our favourite Belgian artists who’s work is on show. Read the rest of this entry »
Who doesn’t like milk & cookies? But do you also know that Milk & Cookies is a renowned Belgian web design & communications agency? They designed websites for the likes of Bruno Pieters, Les Hommes, Maison Michel, MUS,… for which they won numerous awards. They even participated in several brainstormings for Prada, let’s say that people are taking Milk & Cookies’ creativity into account. Read the rest of this entry »
Année érotique is the second brainchild of Kaat Blommaert, a chic sister of her first brand Le Fabuleux Marcel de Bruxelles. Another powerful love brand out of her hands. Her little secret? She’s greatly surrounded by interesting people whose opinions matter. I Love Belgium took a sneak peek at the summer 2012 collection. Read the rest of this entry »
Paris, January 2006. An 8-Track, beat-box, guitar and bass; Brussels native Dan Klein sets about recording the first demo tapes and launches a MySpace profile (wow, that seems a long time ago) and the Vismets take their first baby steps. Read the rest of this entry »
