Palais Mondial, Brussels

Palais Mondial, Brussels

By virtue of their size, cost, and transport connections and investment the sites of World Fairs and exhibitions have important afterlives. Sometimes they are reused for later world fairs (as in the case of Paris), headquarters for international organisations like the United Nations (as in the case of New York), or become large educational or cultural sites (as is the case of Exhibition Road in London). World Fairs were not only major international events therefore, but many sites had curiously internationalist afterlives. This was the case of the grand buildings of the Parc du Cinquantenaire in Brussels, first constructed the Brussels National Exhibition of 1880 and then greatly expanded for the International Exhibition of 1897. By the 1920s these buildings had been repurposed into a major coordinating centre of interwar internationalism under the Belgium internationalists Paul Otlet and Henri LeFontaine. An international museum, conference centre, documentation centre and Union of International Associations called the Palais Mondial (World Palace). The venue hosted a number of international conferences and events, including the second meeting of the 1921 Pan-African Congress.