Notably referred to as ‘The Venice of the North’, Bruges has enjoyed a long and successful economic history as a strategic trading center dating back to the 12th century when a natural channel (the Zwin inlet) emerged off the Flemish coast, allowing the medieval city direct access to the North Sea coast. For the following three centuries Bruges’ urban fabric morphed into a cultural condenser, eagerly welcoming foreign merchants as the epicenter for established northern and southern trade routes. The populat ion of Bruges would grow exponentially around this period (doubling the size of London), creating a considerable exchange of influential ideas leading to a surge in artistic and scientific achievement, known for techniques in weaving/spinning, oil-painting, architecture and the printing press (first book printed in English was published by William Caxton in Bruges). However, by the early 1500s, the Zwin channel would begin to silt and the immediate decline in the city’s economic activity would soon follow. Regardless of rapid maritime modernization to the area and a re-establishment of an oceanic connection, by 1900 Bruges had lost three-quarters of its population, with the majority of foreign trading houses moving to neighboring Antwerp. What was left behind was a preserved, but aging medieval city center. Following the city’s incorporation into Belgium from the United Provinces of the Netherlands, a collection of English aristocrats influenced by the city’s historical and cultural significance, founded the Society for History and Antiquities of Bruges and West Flanders that focused on renewed interest in the artistic heritage of Bruges, including the restoration of historic buildings (some resulting in the construction of pure copies of lost historic buildings) following the destruction of both world wars.
Statue of Van Eyck in Jan van Eyckplein
Belfry of Bruges on Markt (Market Square)
Around 1880, Belgian writer/poet Georges Rodenbach published “Bruges the Dead”, a novel that would describe the town’s abandonment and alerted a growing tourist enterprise to its preserved architectural charm. That, along with the proximity to the Waterloo battlefield, would influence vast numbers of curious, wealthy visitors, bringing much-needed business into Bruges and sealed its fate as a town frozen in time. Through the last century, with some economic vitality, Bruges has had to grapple with the controversal notion of falseness in the urban fabric and the discrepancy between the city center’s artifical architecture versus the more vibrant reality of the surounding industrious suburbs. Once again the city has been commercially exploited; not as a maritime center that had secured economic and contextural opportunities, but as a well-consolidated tourist phenomenon feeding off historical ambience. However, local discussions began to give voice to a concern that evassive tourism has menaced the city’s true heritage, leading to the introduction of ideas on contemporary architecure and the arrival of the European Capital of Culture.
Canal Boat Tour
The Markt ("Market Square")