Tourism is an incredible experience, but traveling fast and in large crowds can have a negative impact on cities, residents, and the environment. This is where slow tourism comes in, encouraging visitors to fully enjoy a destination at a relaxed pace.

Why Choose Slow Tourism?
Slow tourism prioritizes quality over quantity:

• Explore places at your own pace, away from the crowds.
• Support local businesses and the community economy.
• Reduce your ecological footprint by limiting unnecessary travel and overconsumption.
• travel in winter to avoid crowds

A Unique Experience at Every Step
Practicing slow tourism means taking the time to truly feel a city: wandering through streets, talking with locals, tasting regional specialties, and understanding a place’s history and culture. It transforms a simple trip into a genuine immersion, full of authentic emotions and memories. 

Discover Belgium Slowly
In Belgium, slow tourism allows you to fully enjoy its neighborhoods, museums, markets, and iconic cafés. Every walk becomes an opportunity to discover hidden details and create a real connection with the city.
At hello Brussels DMC, we offer experiences designed for slow tourism, such as our Brussels Green Tour: personalized guided tours, local culinary experiences, and activities that respect the pace of both travelers and the city. Traveling differently means discovering more—and discovering better.

Tourism brings many benefits to cities, including jobs, income, and cultural exchange. But when it becomes too intense, it can turn into a serious problem—what we call overtourism. Famous destinations like Venice, Barcelona, or Amsterdam now have to manage massive crowds that affect both residents’ quality of life and the environment.

Bruges, a Medieval Gem Under Pressure
Belgium is not immune to this phenomenon, and Bruges is a striking example. With its picturesque canals, cobbled streets, and well-preserved heritage, Bruges attracts millions of visitors each year. Residents feel the pressure: crowded streets, rising prices, and shops catering almost exclusively to tourists. The charm of the city can sometimes be threatened by the continuous flow of visitors.

To mitigate these effects, initiatives have been introduced: regulating the number of cruise ship passengers, offering visits outside peak periods, and promoting less-visited neighborhoods. The goal is simple: allow travelers to enjoy Bruges while preserving its authenticity and the residents’ quality of life.

A Global Challenge
Bruges is not alone. Overtourism is a worldwide challenge that forces cities to rethink their approach: responsible tourism, off-peak scheduling, visitor awareness, and diversifying activities. Traveling becomes a conscious act, where the joy of tourism does not come at the expense of residents or the environment.

At Hello Brussels DMC, we believe it is possible to discover a city’s treasures while respecting its pace and its people. Our tours and guided experiences are designed to offer authentic experiences, away from the crowds, and allow visitors to truly feel the soul of the city.

The timeless beauty of Hoffmann’s creations not only shows his relevance as a historical phenomenon but also as a source of inspiration for different generations of students, at the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts and elsewhere, making him especially an international reference for postmodern practices. Considering the challenge of introducing Hoffmann in Brussels, this retrospective aims to provide a deeper insight in Hoffmann’s ideals and their evolution both due to and regardless of the diverse ideological and social circumstances in which they took form. The exhibition features a variety of well-known works together with rare pieces from private collections. The narrative is nourished by biographical details and new material on previously overlooked aspects; all to further extend our consideration of a leading figure in the field of modern design.

The sections of the exhibition are oriented around one or more architectural models ––including a new model of Hoffmann’s pavilion for the Werkbund exhibition in Cologne in 1914––that serve as epitomes and key references to consider constellations of furniture, objects, designs, textiles, and documents. In this regard, a juxtaposition of multiple narratives is proposed, covering every aspect of Hoffmann’s artistic production: architecture, design, decorative arts, scenography, writing and teaching. In addition, focus will go to his creative method as well as his use of colour.

The exhibition JOSEF HOFFMANN - Falling for Beauty at the Art & History Museum in Brussels provides an exceptional opportunity to discover an artist who understood beauty as an absolute requirement for individual and social transformation.
This project is developed in collaboration with the Applied Art Museum of Vienna (MAK) and takes as its point of departure  the major scientific work presented in the exhibition JOSEF HOFFMANN: Progress Through Beauty (2020/2021), curated by Matthias Boeckl, Rainald Franz, Christian Witt-Dörring. The exhibition is a central event of the 2023 Art Nouveau year in Brussels.
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Josef Hoffmann was born in 1870 in Brtnice, Moravia, then-part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, today the Czech Republic. He was an architect and “all-round designer”— a description he fully lived up to. As an innovator, he was uniquely conscious of tradition. At the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, he studied under Karl Freiherr von Hasenauer and Otto Wagner. He was among the founders of the Vienna Secession and co-established the Wiener Werkstätte (1903-32), his most-noted achievements including the Purkersdorf Sanatorium (1904-05) or the Palais Stoclet in Brussels (1905-11). Josef Hoffmann’s long life spanned more than eight decades of which he spent at least six active as an artist. Until his death in 1956, at the age of eighty-five, he lived and worked through five succeeding political systems while influencing hundreds of designers to the present day. As he fell in and out of fashion, Hoffmann always remained true to his individual and high creative standards.

Art and History Museum
Parc du Cinquantennaire
Book your ticket for the Josef Hoffmann exhibition on the website of the Art ad History Museum
Opening hours: Tu - Fr : 10 am - 5 pm; Sa - Su - public holidays : 10 am - 5 pm - Closed on Mondays

Animalia is a poetic and scientific journey through the main challenges of our times: threats to the environment, losses of biodiversity and global warming. In this context, trains are an incredible asset towards sustainable mobility.

​Pierre-Yves Renkin, a renowned Belgian animal sculptor, showcases a series of life-like animal art works in Train World. These sculptures enter into dialogue with our railway collections. Through this poetic and confronting journey, you will discover the causes and challenges of the current biodiversity and climate change crises. What are the dangers and what can be done about it? This exhibition also highlights the efforts of the Belgian Railway and Infrabel to reduce the ecological footprint of their activities on the climate and the environment. An exhibition to understand and to act!​