Charleroi
About this Place
Charleroi is one of Wallonia’s principal cities and the historic centre of the surrounding Pays Noir. Its rapid expansion was driven by coal mining, iron and steel, glassmaking and heavy engineering, industries that drew workers from across Belgium and successive generations of migrants from elsewhere in Europe. The factories, workers’ districts and terrils left Charleroi with a powerful industrial identity, but also exposed it particularly sharply to the decline of heavy industry during the later twentieth century.
The city has increasingly reused this inheritance as a setting for culture, creative businesses and new forms of production. The Museum’s connection is La Manufacture Urbaine, or LaMU, a project established in a former printing works in 2017. It brought together a microbrewery, bakery, coffee roastery, restaurants and cultural spaces in central Charleroi. BBG049 provides a small but characteristic record of that attempt to combine local brewing with the city’s wider post-industrial renewal.
Visitor notes
The Bois du Cazier at Marcinelle is the most important place for understanding Charleroi’s industrial and social history. The former colliery commemorates the 262 miners killed in the disaster of 8 August 1956 and also houses museums devoted to industry and glass. Charleroi’s industrial architecture, terrils, street art and museums reveal a city whose character is considerably richer than its old stereotypes suggest.