Will moving Tournai’s Chiffonnades into the Kermesse strengthen the festival or hurt local shops?

Tournai

Place

Tournai

Walloon city where the Chiffonnades, Kermesse and traditional braderie take place.

Why it matters

Walloon city where the Chiffonnades, Kermesse and traditional braderie take place.

About

Tournai is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the Province of Hainaut, Belgium. It lies 89 km (55 mi) by road southwest of the centre of Brussels on the river Scheldt, and is part of Eurometropolis Lille–Kortrijk–Tournai, In 2022, the municipality of Tournai had an estimated population of 68,518 people.

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For residents, visitors and traders in this Walloon city near the French border, the change means a denser festival weekend and a broader shopping offer. It also creates a delicate test for the centre’s retail economy: seven local clothing businesses have petitioned the municipal authorities because the Chiffonnades will now take place during the same long weekend as Tournai’s traditional braderie, according to regional broadcaster Notélé.

The retailers do not oppose the second-hand market itself. Their objection concerns its timing. Notélé reports that they regard the September braderie, scheduled for Monday 14 September, as an important opportunity to clear stock from previous collections. They fear that bringing private sellers of used clothing into the city centre two days earlier will compete with professional shops at one of their most commercially significant moments. The signatories also say the date was fixed without adequate consultation.

Kelly Vandeputte

That difference captures the real policy question behind a seemingly modest calendar adjustment. Tournai Commerces is treating the Chiffonnades as an additional reason to visit the centre, while the petitioning retailers see a competing clothing offer placed beside their own clearance event. Footfall alone will not settle the argument: organisers will also need to know whether visitors spend money in established shops, cafés and other businesses or concentrate their purchases at the second-hand stalls.

The city’s official tourism service presents the change as part of an unusually concentrated programme. Visit Tournai says the Chiffonnades and Brocante des 5 Clochers will occupy the centre on Saturday, followed on Sunday by the Grande Procession and the four traditional cortèges. The braderie then stretches over about 2.5 kilometres on Monday and is expected to bring together roughly 250 professional and itinerant exhibitors. A separate funfair will operate on the Esplanade du Conseil de l’Europe from 5 to 27 September; despite the square’s name, this is a municipal festival location, not an event run by an EU institution or by the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe.

The Chiffonnades have long been part of Tournai’s local events calendar. A municipal publication recorded an August edition on the Scheldt quays as early as 2015, while the city advertised two editions in 2018. The move therefore alters an established rhythm rather than creating a new market. It also comes before a wider redesign of the Kermesse announced for 2027, although the detailed form of that overhaul has not yet been published.

No federal, Walloon or European authority has announced a role in the scheduling dispute, which remains a local matter involving Tournai Commerces, participating traders, the municipal authorities and festival-goers. The next meaningful evidence will come on 12 and 14 September: attendance, sales patterns and feedback from retailers and stallholders will show whether clustering the events creates mutual benefit or merely shifts spending between them. What remains unclear is how success will be measured and whether the organisers will publish a formal post-event assessment before deciding the Chiffonnades’ 2027 date.