Women’s business/Businesswomen

9 generations of stories in publishing house and home

The cliché goes that behind every successful man there is a strong woman. But in the Plantin-Moretus family, women most definitely stood alongside their husbands, and not behind them. From the 13th of September onward, the museum will uncover 300 years of stories from women in this house. Stories that urgently need to be told. About daughters who corrected proofs from an early age. About maids and ladies. About women who not only climbed the social ladders, but made the ladders too. Men are also welcome.

Saturday 13 September 2025 until Sunday 11 January 2026 from 10:00 to 16:30

Family business

The first three male managers of Plantin’s printing and publishing house are particularly well known: founder Christopher Plantin, son-in-law Jan and grandson Balthazar Moretus. However, in the 16th to 19th centuries the printing trade was anything but a man's business. The Officina Plantiniana was a family business with master printers, apprentices, maids and workmen of all kinds. The traces of the women who lived and worked here are fainter and less well documented.

Of businesswomen and women’s business

The archives of the Museum Plantin-Moretus contain a treasure trove of letters, household journals and diaries that give us an insight into the lives of the women of this house. Their stories will retake their rightful place in the museum from September 13, 2025. Meet daughters who improved proofs and struck trade deals from an early age. Meet businesswomen who became company directors. Look over the shoulder of mothers who closely supervised their children's education.