“Enhancing yesterday’s heritage and building the city of tomorrow”: this task is at the core of Urban’s activities, and is carried out in many ways. Urban’s various teams are working together to achieve this objective, including a team of passionate archaeologists, of course!
In early August, our archaeologists were delighted to welcome three guests to their laboratory: Frieda Sorber, specialist in historic textiles, Judith Goris, expert from IRPA’s textiles workshop, and author and journalist Tom Dieusaert.
In fact, Mr. Dieusaert was looking for remnants of the 16th-century production of fabrics and sheets for the next book he is writing. His previous book, ”Rond de Kaap”, already dealt with the life of an Antwerp merchant that lived in the late 16th century - Isaac Lemaire, one of the founders of the Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie).His travels and the discovery of the passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans along Cape Horn have captivated readers.
In 2019, Urban carried out archaeological digs on the site of the former Parking 58. Ms Judith Goris then carried out the conservation work on the remains of medieval woollen sheets that had been found. These witnesses to the past are exceptional: it is very rare to find such material evidence in our regions because they are extremely fragile. This was an excellent opportunity to show our exceptional collection of archaeological textiles.
A wonderful encounter between an author who researches in detail a production typical of that period in our region, and specialist restorers and archaeologists.