I found more pictures of this wonderful place and feel they should be in my blog, This we have been a couple times and love it, one of our favorites in Europe. I like to tell you more of the Autoworld in Brussels !!
This is a magical place, if you like automobiles and been around them ,then it is a must. The thrill of speed and freedom of travel is unsurpassed. After years, it became clear that the affection was not just speed but the beauty of the craftmanship ,the men who rode it, and the stories behind building them. see the Autoworld in Brussels, awesome !
I will be telling a bit more on the AutoWorld of Brussels. The Autoworld is an automobile museum house in the Halle Sud or south hall of the Palais du Cinquantenaire (parc du Cinquantenaire) in glass and steel that was built for the universal exposition of 1897. Precisely it is at 11, Parc du Cinquantenaire. You can there by Metro Schuman and Merode, stations on lines 1 and 5. Also, by Tramway at Place Saint-Pierre, on lines 81 and 83. The bus have lines Gaulois, lines 22, 27 and 80; and Merode, line 61.
I have been to auto museums but this one is the best for sure. You see motocycles, jeeps, fire truck, etc, you have a nice restaurant and neat complete boutique store. It all started here in 1986 The museum now has about 400 vehicules from automobile collections retracing the histoy of it from 1886 to 1960 and carriages, motocycles etc. By visiting Autoworld, you will discover the origins of the automobile and go through the Belle Époque, the Great War, the Roaring Twenties, the 1930s, the Second World War, the 1950s, then you will gradually go to our days.
In 1986, the Autoworld was chosen to receive the Mahy Collection. The latter is a private collection belonging to the Mahy family, whose grandfather Ghislain Mahy was a car enthusiast. Indeed, in 1924, he built his first car, then later embarked on the renovation of old cars. Thus, of the thousand vehicles that make up the collection, 1/4 are presented at Autoworld. The other models can be found at the Mahymobiles Museum in Leuze-en-Hainaut, 1 hour from Brussels. And since we are in the country of comic strips, logically, a space is dedicated to Michel Vaillant. Comic book hero, he is the famous car driver who made his debut in 1957 in Tintin’s Diary. Thus, you will find in this exhibition, one of the real F1 Vaillante of the character of the film by Luc Besson, shot in 2003. And of course, you will be able to leaf through, in the same place, the comic strips of the hero.
A new bit of history on the building housing Autoworld, the museum has been located since 1986 in the great southern hall of the Cinquantenaire. The building results from the division of a vast continuous metal hall, designed in 1881 for the Grand Concours international des Sciences et de l’Industrie of 1888. The 1888 Competition succeeded the National Exhibition of 1880, which gave its name to the Cinquantenaire site. Baptized Halle Internationale des Machines it was designed with a single span over 235 meters in length, this innovative construction with a metal frame succeeds the Galerie des Machines, a temporary hall which was the highlight of the 1880 Exhibition. Unlike the latter, the hall of 1888 is kept after the competition and assigned to agricultural and industrial exhibitions. Extended a hundred meters to the north on the occasion of the Universal Exhibition of 1897, the building reaches 340 meters. As king Leopold II had demanded, five of its spans were dismantled in the axis of the arcade the following year, in order to clear the perspective towards the newly created Avenue de Tervueren. The building is therefore transformed into two separate halls. In 1899, the southern hall was extended by 60 meters towards the avenue des Nerviens, using some of the materials resulting from the dismantling. During the 20C, the southern hall hosted, like its northern counterpart, various events, fairs and temporary exhibitions. In 1986, Autoworld moved there !
The official Autoworld museum: https://www.autoworld.be/home
The Brussels tourist office on Autoworld : https://www.visit.brussels/en/visitors/venue-details.Autoworld.734
The museums of Brussels on the Autoworld: https://www.brusselsmuseums.be/en/museums/autoworld-museum-brussels
There you go folks, hope you enjoy it as much as we did. An awesome Autoworld to hold onto it, and nice walks afterward from here in pretty Brussels. And remember, happy travels, good health ,and many cheers to all !!!
Paris1972-Versailles2003 