• Opening times

  16/10/2024 - 13/04/2025: * monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday, friday, saturday and sunday: from 11:00 to 19:00

Examples range from the overlooked productions of Maria Sèthe to the Belgian Art Nouveau to Hélène Denis-Bohy’s bold modern typography for her feminist pamphlets printed on the La Cambre printing press; from extraordinary Belle Époque ceramics by designers trained at Belgium’s first professional school for women to anonymous lacework in raffia made in Congolese missionary schools. The exhibition showcases the significant but under-valued creativity of women in diverse fields of crafts and design from an original, thematic approach. Through a focus on visibility, the show examines how women used design as a means of empowerment, signing their work, asserting their presence in exhibitions and making significant advancements in the field. Their work will be showcased as a testament to their resilience, innovation and creativity. Simultaneously, the exhibition addresses the challenges of invisibility faced by women designers. Their authorship was frequently obscured because of societal norms, social class, their behind-the-scenes work or within collaborative environments. This exploration will reveal instances where their contributions were overlooked, wrongly attributed or remained unrecognised, leading to a lack of knowledge of their work and its recognition. Moreover, this exhibition delves into the professionalisation of women designers, tracing their journey as they navigated educational institutions (as pupils and teachers), organisations and networks to establish themselves within professional circles. This journey highlights their determination and means to carve out a space for themselves in a predominantly male-dominated industry. Lastly, the realm of domesticity demonstrates how women, often from within and for the decoration of their homes, created their own visual and material culture and surroundings, which was in turn considered inferior or instrumentalised for moralistic purposes. They were driven by functional needs, tradition, so-called ‘virtue’ or a lack of suitable options in the commercial market. This exploration will underscore how women makers, whether as individuals or collectively, employed their ingenuity and resourcefulness to express their vision.

• Opening times

  16/10/2024 - 09/03/2025: * monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday, friday, saturday and sunday: from 11:00 to 19:00

• Price

  Normal: 8,00 € - Article 27: 1,25 €

After a presentation in Weil am Rhein, Rotterdam and Vienna, the highly anticipated exhibition Here We Are! Women in Design 1900 – Today comes to Brussels. Through a rich collection of creative designs, the exhibition – curated by Susanne Graner, Viviane Stappmanns and Nina Steinmüller from the Vitra Design Museum team – traces the work and working conditions of women in design – from the beginnings of modernism to the present day. A journey through 120 years of design history that tells a multifaceted story of design in light of the struggle for equal rights and appreciation. Women have made crucial contributions to the development of modern design, both creatively and commercially, and yet they are often overlooked. The exhibition puts the spotlight on 80 women designers who have helped shape the design industry, including pioneers Charlotte Perriand, Eileen Gray, Lilly Reich and Clara Porset or entrepreneurs Florence Knoll and Armi Ratia, as well as discoveries such as the socially-minded Jane Addams. The exhibition – structured chronologically in four sections – offers a fresh perspective on modern and contemporary design.

Join us at Design Museum Brussels for a panel discussion exploring the ways in which women can generate social change through design practices that combine art, craft and technology. Bringing together curators, educators and historians, the event will examine how women-led design can engage and transform communities. Design Stories is a part of Looking Through Objects: Women in Contemporary Polish Design – a research project exploring women’s contribution to change through design and creative practices. The project includes a touring exhibition, lecture series, talks and interviews organized in different locations across Poland, UK, Belgium and the Baltics. Design Stories / Brussels panel discussion is a springboard for the upcoming exhibition Looking Through Objects showing at the Design Museum Brussels between 9 May to 28 September 2025. Design Stories / Brussels and Looking Through Objects is a collaboration between Design Museum Brussels, Polish Institute Brussels, SWPS University and Royal College of Art, and in partnership with Disegno Journal. The initiative is part of the Polish Presidency of the Council of the European Union in 2025. Participating Speakers: Gian Luca Amadei, Arnaud Bozzini, Agnieszka Jacobson-Cielecka, Katarina Serulus, Marjan Sterckx. Moderated by: Oli Stratford, Disegno Journal. Project curators: Gian Luca Amadei and Agnieszka Jacobson-Cielecka. Design Museum Brussels coordinator: Terry Scott.

• Price

  Normal: 10,00 € - Etudiants: 5,00 €

On February 11th, 2025, PAF and Design Museum Brussels join forces to organize the conversation ‘Rebalancing: gender bias in the design world’, accompanying the exhibition Untold Stories- Women Designers in Belgium 1880-1980. Together with the speakers and the audience, we discuss themes represented in the exhibition ranging from professionalisation versus domesticity, (un)visibility, authorship, and collaboration. We invite everyone to join the conversation and share experiences and ideas to build a more equitable and inclusive (interior) design sector. Due to the patriarchal forces that historically shaped design, the work of women designers is often absent or invisible in collections, archives and academic literature. How do gender bias and inequality still work today? How have patriarchal mechanisms shaped the (interior) design sector, from gender-coded education to ideas on professionalisation and authorship? What is the experience of women designers in Belgium today? What do they still come up against and what tactics or strategies do they use to flourish in their design practice? And are there any tactics we can learn from the women designers who came before us? In this conversation, we reflect on these questions with Nina Serulus (co-curator of the exhibition Untold Stories – Women Designers in Belgium 1880-1980), Benoît Vandevoort (PhD researcher on the professionalisation of interior design), Mathilde Pecqueur (textile designer, Maak&Transmettre) and Stefanie Everaert and Caroline Lateur (Doorzon interior architects). Speakers: Nina Serulus (co-curator of the exhibition Untold Stories – Women Designers in Belgium 1880-1980) Benoît Vandevoort (PhD researcher on the professionalisation of interior design) Mathilde Pecqueur (textile designer, Maak&Transmettre) Stefanie Everaert and Caroline Lateur (Doorzon interior architects). Program: 19:00 – 19:15: Introduction 19:15 – 20:00: Conversation with the speakers on rebalancing gender bias and inequality in the (interior) design sector. 20:00 – 20:45: Conversation in small groups on Professionalisation <> Domesticity Visibility <> Unvisibility Collectives/Collaboration <> Autorship 20:45 – 21:00: Conclusions

Javier Gimeno-Martínez is an associate professor of design history and theory at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. His research interest encompasses issues of national identity and displacement as related to design. His articles have been published in academic journals such as Journal of Design History, Design Issues, Design and Culture, The Burlington Magazine and Urban Studies. He is the author of the books Design and National Identity (Bloomsbury Academic, 2016) and Design History and Culture. Methods and Approaches (Routledge, 2025). He is a member of the International Committee for Design History and Design Studies (ICDHS).