Ixelles

Ixelles (French, pronounced [iksɛl] ) or Elsene (Dutch, pronounced [ˈɛlsənə] ) is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium. Located to the south-east of Brussels' city centre, it is geographically bisected by the City of Brussels. It is also bordered by the municipalities of Auderghem, Etterbeek, Forest, Uccle, Saint-Gilles and Watermael-Boitsfort.

Ixelles
  • Ixelles (French)
  • Elsene (Dutch)
  • The Ixelles Ponds and Tenbosch Park are noted parks in the middle of the municipality.
  • The Flagey Building, also known as the Radio House, a Streamline Moderne building on the Place Eugène Flagey, used to house the Belgian National Institute of Radio Broadcasting (INR/NIR).
  • The Résidence de la Cambre, the first high-rise building in Brussels, on the Boulevard Général Jacques/Generaal Jacqueslaan, is another notable Art Deco building.
  • Ixelles was a centre of Art Nouveau architecture in the first decades of the 20th century. Several Art Nouveau houses built by Victor Horta are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and some of them can be visited.
  • The three Brussels universities—the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and Saint-Louis University—have campuses in Ixelles. As a result, the south-eastern part of the municipality is home to a large number of students.
  • Ixelles Cemetery is one of the most important cemeteries in the country as it contains the graves of a number of famous Belgian personalities. It was there, in 1891, that the French General Georges Boulanger, leader of the right-wing Boulangerists, committed suicide, on the tomb of his mistress, who had died a couple of months earlier.
  • Ixelles also houses several interesting churches and museums, including the Museum of Ixelles, as well as the Constantin Meunier Museum, established in the residence where the artist lived part of his life.

Events

Several fairs are organised in Ixelles, including the Spring Fair on the Place Eugène Flagey, which takes place between the fourth and sixth Sunday after Easter, as well as the Boondael Fair at the end of July.[citation needed]

Brussels Universities Cyclocross is a cyclo-cross race that is regularly held in the adjacent campuses of the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), located in eastern Ixelles.[citation needed]

Demographics

Migrant communities in Ixelles with over 1,000 people as of 1 January 2020:

France 11,470
Italy 4,504
Spain 2,540
Portugal 1,795
Germany 1,793
Romania 1,750
Poland 1,378
United Kingdom 1,188
Morocco 1,107
Greece 1,045
Group of origin Year
2023
Number %
Belgians with Belgian background 20,038 22.64%
Belgians with foreign background 23,999 27.11%
Neighbouring country 3,587 4.05%
EU27 (excluding neighbouring country) 3,657 4.13%
Outside EU 27 16,755 18.93%
Non-Belgians 44,484 50.25%
Neighbouring country 15,519 17.53%
EU27 (excluding neighbouring country) 16,208 18.31%
Outside EU 27 12,757 14.41%
Total 88,521 100%

Politics

The current city council was elected in the October 2018 elections. The current mayor of Ixelles is Christos Doulkeridis [fr], a member of Ecolo, who is in coalition on the municipal council with PS - sp.a.

Ixelles local election – 14 October 2018
Party
Votes % Swing (pp) Elected
2018
Change
Ecolo - Groen 10,817 33.05 9.53
16 / 43 (37%)
5
MR - Open Vld 8,364 25.55 3.54
12 / 43 (28%)
3
PS - sp.a 6,190 18.91 2.30
9 / 43 (21%)
1
DéFI 2,342 7.16 5.05
2 / 43 (5%)
3
PVDA-PTB 2,049 6.26 4.44
2 / 43 (5%)
2
cdH - CD&V (Objective XL) 1,817 5.55 3.86
2 / 43 (5%)
2
N-VA 960 2.93 0.58
0 / 43 (0%)
-
Volt 191 0.58 New
0 / 43 (0%)
-

International relations

Twin towns and sister cities

Ixelles is twinned with:

  • Biarritz, France (since 1958)
  • Kalamu, municipality in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo (since 2003)
  • Zababdeh, Palestine (since 2003)
  • Kibbutz Megiddo, Israel (since 2012, suspended in July 2024)
  • Lichtenberg, Germany

Notable inhabitants

Born in Ixelles:

  • Agnès Varda (1928-2019), film director
  • Albert Crahay (1903–1991), soldier and commander of the Belgian battalion at the Battle of the Imjin River during the Korean War
  • Anna Boch (1848–1936), impressionist painter and art collector
  • Annemie Neyts (born 1944), politician and MEP
  • Audrey Hepburn (1929–1993), British actress, model, and humanitarian
  • Auguste Alfred Lucien Lameere (1864–1942), entomologist
  • Auguste Perret (1874–1954), architect
  • Boris Szulzinger (born 1945), film director and producer
  • Camille Lemonnier (1844–1913), writer and poet
  • Emile Vandervelde (1866–1938), statesman, socialist leader, Minister of Justice, and Minister of Foreign Affairs
  • Frank Ntilikina (born 1998), professional basketball player
  • Grand Jojo (1936–2021), singer-songwriter
  • Michel Regnier, also known as Greg (1931–1999), comic book author
  • Jacky Ickx (born 1945), racing driver
  • Jaco Van Dormael (born 1957), screenwriter and film director
  • Jacques Feyder (1885–1948), screenwriter and film director
  • Jean-François van Boxmeer (born 1961), businessman, chairman and CEO of Heineken International
  • Jules de Burlet (1844–1897), politician, senator, Interior Minister, Prime Minister, and Belgian ambassador to Portugal
  • Julio Cortázar (1914–1984), novelist
  • Kris Bosmans (born 1980), cyclist
  • Leo Joseph Suenens (1904–1996), cardinal and Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels
  • Marc Dutroux (born 1956), convicted child molester and serial killer
  • Marc Moulin (1942–2008), jazz and fusion musician, author
  • Michel de Ghelderode (1898–1962), avant-garde dramatist
  • Natacha Régnier (born 1974), actress
  • Paul Hymans (1865–1941), politician and first President of the League of Nations
  • Paul Saintenoy (1862–1952), architect, teacher, architectural historian, and writer
  • Pierre Kolp (born 1969), composer
  • Pierre Rapsat (1948–2002), singer-songwriter
  • Rik Coolsaet (born 1951), academic
  • Sophie Wilmès (born 1975), politician, Prime Minister, and Minister of Foreign Affairs
  • Ursula von der Leyen (born 1958), German Federal Minister for Labour and Social Affairs, German Minister of Defence, and President of the European Commission
  • Yannick Carrasco (born 1993), football player

Lived in Ixelles:

  • Anna Boch (1848–1936), artist and art collector, owner of the Villa Anna
  • Antoine Wiertz (1806–1865), painter and sculptor
  • August de Boeck (1865–1937), composer, organist, and music pedagogue
  • Auguste Rodin (1840–1917), sculptor
  • Charles de Coster (1827–1879), novelist
  • Constantin Meunier (1831–1905), painter and sculptor
  • Damso (born 1992), Belgian-Congolese rapper, singer, and songwriter
  • Edith Cavell (1865–1915), British nurse and World War I martyr, ran a nursing school there from 1907.
  • Elisée Reclus (1830–1905), geographer and anarchist
  • Ernest Solvay (1838–1922), chemist, industrialist, and philanthropist
  • Giacomo Puccini (1858–1924), Italian composer; lived and died at 1, avenue de la Couronne/Kroonlaan; a tablet with an inscription is visible on the building wall.
  • Henriëtte Ronner-Knip (1821–1909), painter
  • Jean-Baptiste Moens (1833–1908), philatelist and stamp dealer
  • Jacky Ickx (born 1945), racing driver
  • Johan Michiel Dautzenberg (1834–1878), writer
  • Karl Marx (1818–1883), German philosopher, social theorist, political economist, and socialist revolutionary
  • Maria Malibran (1808–1836), mezzo-soprano
  • Naim Khader (1939–1981), representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization
  • Neel Doff (1858–1942), writer
  • Octave Maus (1856–1919), art critic, writer, and lawyer
  • Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865), anarchist thinker
  • Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924), Russian revolutionary and first head of the Soviet Union

Footnotes

  1. Pennebeek was the original name of the Maelbeek spring.
  2. The Bishop of Cambrai is said to have brought two pieces of the original cross with him.

wikipedia, wiki, encyclopedia, book, library, article, read, free download, Information about Ixelles, What is Ixelles? What does Ixelles mean?