In France, the lust for shimmering luxury led Lyon, in the southeast of France, to become one of the greatest silk weaving centres on earth. The story of silk and Lyon has been woven over 500 years. The city's economic destiny was probably sealed in 1540 when French King, Francois I, decided all raw silk arriving in France from Italy and Asia had to stop in Lyon first. Later decrees under King Louis XIV and Napoleon to buy only silk products from Lyon tightened that monopoly. #SharedFuture10Year

#MuseumWeek #SecretsMW : The Jacquard loom is the earliest programmable computer, it was invented in 1804 by Joseph Marie Jacquard. Originally the loom was controlled by a chain of punched cards, and each card corresponded to one row of design. The first theorist enviosining such a device for uses beyond mere calculation was Ada Lovelace. Nowadays the loom is programed by a computer. Our Il Museo's current exhibition, Ancient Women in Textile, displays Ruth Scheuing's Jacquard Weavings, in which