Urban Tissues: Mapping Brussels Through Threads

At the heart of the exhibition lies a playful yet thought-provoking question: What if each Brussels municipality were something else entirely? A spice, a colour, a sound, a season, or a fabric. Through workshops held across seven municipalities, participants were invited to reinterpret their neighbourhoods using sensory and symbolic commonality. These creative prompts opened space for dialogue, challenged stereotypes, and allowed personal narratives to shape new, collective maps of the city.

Urbanis Tissues (Urban Fabrics) is a travelling exhibition across Brussels that invites us to rethink the city through lived experience, memory, and material. Rather than mapping Brussels through borders or infrastructure, the exhibition redraws the city through textiles—threads, fabrics, wool, and stories—woven together by its inhabitants. Each piece becomes both a personal reflection and a collective expression, showing Brussels as a living fabric shaped by those who experience it daily.

We had the opportunity to visit Urbanis Tissues during its stop in Anderlecht with the guidance of Charles Manche from our network, and the experience was totally inspiring. The exhibition shows that the city is not a fixed entity, but a space continuously shaped by emotions, encounters, and memories. The combination of visual and audio elements created a sense of closeness to the stories behind each piece.

Sustainability is embedded throughout the project. All fabrics were sourced from second-hand shops. In 2025, 24 workshops brought together 314 participants, resulting in textile maps that required over 200 hours of collective work. As Urbanis Tissues continues to travel across Brussels, we encourage everyone to visit the exhibition at its different locations and experience these maps of the city for themselves.

Thanks to Charles Manche for guiding us through this meaningful exploration of memory, identity, and place.