Comic books are considered an important part of Belgian culture. So it seemed only fitting that one of the biggest icons in pop culture, Apple, would team up with comic artists for the opening of the first-ever Apple store in Brussels.
Apple released a two-minute video over the weekend on its YouTube channel to show off the artists behind the marketing to announce the store’s opening, set for Saturday.
“In Brussels, you can’t turn onto any street without being confronted with cartoons,” artist Wauter Mannaert explains in the video. “Cartoons are alive in Brussels, and as a cartoonist, it’s important to feel that.”
Belgians have had to buy their Apple products in Germany and France, but considering the county’s first store will open just 10 days after Apple’s fall announcement of new products, like the iPhone 6s and the iPad Pro, Brusselaars may be among the first to get a hands-on look at the new devices.
Belgian publishers began producing comic books in the 1920s and rose to be a major influence in Europe’s popularity of comic books and comic art.
The store will be located on Avenue de la Toison d’Or and is currently boarded up with comic panels that take the form of the Apple logo. It will be a full-service store that includes workshops and a Genius Bar.
For now, the storefront reads, “Creativity. To Be Continued.”