Index to carillons and chimes by Michaux

The Michaux foundry, now closed, provided bells for various carillons and chimes in the lowlands of Europe. See the bottom of this page for historical notes on the origin and development of this bellfoundry and on the various names used by it. Some links to pages about the history of this foundry can be found after the index.

For an explanation of what this index contains (and does NOT contain), and of the additional details on each entry, see the Bellfoundry Indexes Advice.

Michaux, Leuven, Belgium

ARLON                         : BELGIUM      19?? C  chime
   Eglise St.Donat

BRAINE-LE-COMTE               : BELGIUM      1911 C (trad)
   Eglise St.GŽry
DIEST                         : BELGIUM      1912 I  trad
   Sint Sulpitiuskerk (Collegiale)
    (St.Sulpicius)
GENT - B                      : BELGIUM      1913 I  trad
   Belfort
HALLE                         : BELGIUM      1920 I  trad
   O.L.V. Basiliek
   (was Hoofdkerk St.Martinus until 1946)
LOUVAIN-LA-NEUVE              : BELGIUM      1921*F  non-trad
   FacultŽ de ThŽologie
   Collge Albert Descamps
   made for another location
SAINT-QUENTIN                 : FRANCE - 02  1924 E  trad
   H™tel de Ville
WINGENE                       : BELGIUM      1924 I  trad
   Sint-Amanduskerk
DENDERMONDE - B               : BELGIUM      1925 E (trad)
   Belfort--Stadhuis/Lakenhal/Town Hall
ZOTTEGEM                      : BELGIUM      1925 I  trad
   City Carillon
   O.L.V. Hemelvaartkerk
   (Assumption of Our Lady)
OUDENAARDE                    : BELGIUM      1926 E (trad)
   Ste.Walburgatoren (or St.Walburgis)

Historical Notes:

Omer Michaux was born in 1877 in Jambes, which since 1977 is part of Namen. He settled at Leuven as bell-founder, successor of Alphons Beullens. On a bell from 1904 is therefore found: "O.Michaux succ. A. Beullens Louvain." He cast some carillons, but without any success. In 1929 he stopped casting bells himself and obtained them henceforth from Marcel Michiels, Jr. of Tournai. Shortly thereafter he moved to Brussels where he died in 1955. In 1937 he sold a carillon to Alfred University in upstate New York. There were supposedly eighteen original bells of Pieter Hemony from 1674. But that is untrue. They are replicas of bells from the Mechelen carillon which were cast by Michiels.

Source: A.Lehr, Register of [Dutch-related] bellfounders (in Dutch only); translation by Google and C.Zimmerman

The forgery was not discovered for many years.

Links:

Photo of a small Michaux bell which was once in the carillon of Gent; installed 1912, removed 1931.

Photo of Omer Michaux with Jef Denyn (carillonneur) and Charles Somers (carillon installer), in Somers' workshop in Mechelen. The bells in the background were cast by Michiels for the 1939 World's Fair in New York, and were eventually installed at Stanford University in California. Possibly Michaux is here as a representative of Michiels.

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This index page was built from the database on 20-Sep-12 and last revised on 1-Mar-24.

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