Traditional handloom, weaving hemp.

These looms wer wide-spread in all farms from the 11th century,  up to the start of industrial development (1840). 

Traditonal handloom. 11th century

        Around 1740 we see the first looms with mechanism. A cilinder carrying 4 cards commands the shafts and decides the weave. With flying shuttle (invented in 1733)

Handloom with mechanism and flying shuttle (1733)

  Handloom equipped with jacquard mechanism (mid XIXth century).

Each warp thread is commanded to lift indepentently, realising any imaginable pattern.

Early jacquardloom (1803).

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 Jacquard mechanism, 104 hooks. (1803)

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     Making the cards, today a computeraided process, is the result of a complicated system, starting in the 18th century. The drawing was coppied on glass plates and projected on millimeter paper. This projection was the coppied on the paper to obtain the card drawing.

The lantern.

Drawing in creation

        Read in frame. 

        The drawing is then read on the simple which is pending in the read-in     frame.                                    

Perforation is done on the punching machine, first lever operated, later by steam and even later by electricity.

    Punching machine

  In 1946, Mr. Verdol, (Switserland), developped the prototype for this card reader. All logical procedures are now read by means of elctronics.

Dactyliseuse Verdol 

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       Today, the creators no longer work on real cards, buth on computer programs. This programs will command the looms electronicaly.

Visit our creation page to learn more..

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This loom with jacksticks (1860) is surmounted bij 6 mechanisms. 10688 warp threads, 30 000 cards.

Powerloom nuyts.

Loom Léon Olivier ( Roubaix 1900). Shuttles projected by picking sticks. A dobbymachine lifts the shafts.

Loom Leon Olivier

Loom Dewaele-schotte (Harelbeke Belgium, 1910). This "pick-pick"loom counts four repetitions, reproducing the same pattern 4 times.

Loom Dewaele-schotte

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Loom Saurer (Switserland, 1958). Wide pick-pick loom(2,60 meters) with 2 mechanisms and 5 shuttles in lifting boxes, 120 RPM .....

Powerloom Saurer

Prototype Dewas.(Amiens 1951). This process with shuttle came into general use about 1960-70.

Prototype Dewas 

Loom Fatex (Lyon 1968) One single rapier. 3 warp beams. 120 RPM.

Loom Fatex.

Loom Vamatex ( Italy 1984). 2 flexible half rapiers. 2 mechanisms, 300 RPM.

Loom Vamatex

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Loom Picanol (Belgium 1994). 2 flexible rapiers, electronic cards. 450 RPM. Worked in our mill till 01-05-2001.

Loom Picanol

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Loom Ywer (Pamplona Spain 1970)

Not a jacquardloom, produces 2 velvets simultaniously. 3 warpbeams, 2 parallel rigid rapiers, contributed a lot to the fame of Flanders textile.

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Stearings of shuttles and warp.

Ribbonloom (St. Etienne 1884) Weaves 12 silk ribbons simultaniously. Home production. 

Ribbon weaving loom,  Stéphanoise region.

No warpbeams on this loom. The warp is delivered by 156 little spools.

And wile the adults were weaving, kids starting from the age of 5 made the shuttle spools.

Nintendo (1884)

Every ribbon has 4 little shuttles.

A marvel of inventivity: the commands of the shuttles.

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Above, you have seen every single loom in our museum. These pictures can only give you a first little impression of the adventure you can live, while visiting the Manufacture des Flandres. We offer you a voyage trough 2 centuries of the patrimony of textile in Flanders and the north of France. In the same way as the prince did by kissing the sleaping beauty, let us awake for you this patrimony, so beloved by our ancestors. Let your 5 senses discover the know-how that once was the heartbeat of the region in our manufacturies.

• Smell the odor of oil and yarns, so well known by our ancestors.

• See the halls where they earned their daily bread, and learn their movements.

• Hear the noisy heartbeat that once filled the streets of Roubaix and the whole of Flanders.

• Tuch the products that once meant prosperity for this region.

• Taste the nostalgy in our treasure-rooms.

Visit the page, with our co-ordinates, and come and enjoy all the pleasure a guided visit in "la Manufacture des Flandres" can give you. Former weavers, now guides, will comment your trip, not forgetting some humor, and will put to work every single loom. They will make revive for you the whole history of these techniques, and tell the stories of social and human interest, concerning the life of textile in this region. Bring your friends!  All these marvels are explained in French, English , Dutch or German. A team of passionated souls invites you, die-hards who are eager to preserve this disappearing patrimony for you and your children. 

Help us, before this all disappears in thin air!!

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José Honoré

Multilingual guide. Organisation of the museum.

Amélie Vandrisse

Public relations and reservations.

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