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Discover Quartier National
Fashion fanciers take note! Gathered together in Quartier National are the famed Antwerp 6 designers and the Fashion Museum, making it the city’s epic fashion centre. Discover for yourself the trendy, stylish boutiques that are in abundance in this hip neighbourhood made up of Nationalestraat, Kammenstraat and Steenhouwersvest.
Nationalestraat runs from Groenplaats in the city centre to the Tropical Institute, where it forks off into Volksstraat and Geusensstraat. On it you’ll find design shops with household names, the MoMu Fashion Museum and the Flanders Fashion Institute (FFI) mixed in with local shops and eateries. Three small squares border Nationalestraat, creating a green lung and thus providing pleasant breathing spaces in an area that is otherwise an intense shopping experience..
Close by is also Kammenstraat, the street for the hip and trendy. Taking their cue from the creative flair of Nationalestraat, young and spunky start-ups displaying colourful streetwear pop up alongside established boutiques. Mixed inbetween are alternative offerings such as tattoo and piercing parlours and a sci-fi and fantasy shop, as well as trendy lighting shops and original food bars. Definitely the place to be for hipsters.
The Antwerp Six
The Antwerp Six, also known as the Six of Antwerp, is a group of well-known Belgian fashion designers who graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Antwerp in the 1980s. In 1986, they made their international breakthrough at a London trade show, putting Antwerp on the fashion map.
The group’s members are: Dirk Bikkembergs, Ann Demeulemeester, Walter Van Beirendonck, Dries Van Noten, Dirk Van Saene and Marina Yee.
A street with a unique and distinct character, Steenhouwersvest is located between Nationalestraat and Oever. It offers a stylish and quirky mix of fashion, jewellery, eyewear and furniture. Off on a side street you’ll find the Vrijdagmarkt – see below.
An eclectic collection of unique hotels connected by comfort, where family and personal touches are everything, and local character and colour are guaranteed.
Vrijdagmarkt (“Friday Market”), held on – you guessed – Fridays, on the eponymous square where the hip Banks hotel is also to be found, is more of an auction than a market. In the middle of the square, dealers jovially prize their household effects and bags full of miscellaneous trinkets at a loud volume so that even the people on the terraces get to enjoy the action – or even take part in the bidding. When it’s all over – at least on a sunny day if you’re lucky – the terraces of the surrounding cafes and restaurants take over again. We mention just two of them: Camino, where you can enjoy a lunch of Asian food, or In de Roscam, a café that serves daily specials such as fish stew and lasagne.
In the middle of the square, dealers jovially prize their household effects and bags full of miscellaneous trinkets
