The 19 mayors and numerous city councillors in the Brussels-Capital Region will get a gender-neutral sash in the future. The difference will not only be in the colour and model of the sash, but also in how it is worn.
Brussels mayors have been wearing a sash with three vertical bands (black, yellow and red) and silver fringes since 1837. For city councillors, the sash has two bands (yellow and black) with red fringes, but the colours will soon change for the latter.
From now on, they will wear a sash in blue and yellow, the colours of the Capital Region. The colours of the mayors' sashes will remain unchanged. Additionally, for both mayors and city councillors, sashes will bear the iris flower – the symbol of Brussels – announced the regional minister Bernard Clerfayt in a statement.
"It is time to modernise the sash of the local representatives and to make it more in line with the reality of Brussels. We now have five women mayors in the Brussels Region and I am delighted that the role is becoming more feminine," he said. "We must therefore adapt the wearing of the sash to no longer make a distinction between sexes."
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Therefore, the way it is worn will also change: the new rule states that it will be worn à la française, from the left shoulder to the right hand. "So there will no longer be any question of masculinising the custom. Until now, it was prescribed to wear the sash around the waist."
The changes will take effect after the next municipal elections in 2024.
It is also not the first time the mayoral sash has been adapted. In 2006, the Walloon Region decided that mayors and city councillors could choose to wear their sash around the waist or over the shoulder. The Flemish Region changed the colours of its sashes in 2007, but kept the gender distinction when wearing them: around the waist for men and over the shoulder for women.
