The Maison des Canuts on the Rue d'Ivry in Croix-Rousse is both a museum and a working silk workshop. Demonstrations on original Jacquard looms show how the punched-card weaving technology that transformed the textile industry in the early 19th century actually worked — and give a sense of why the buildings of Croix-Rousse were designed with such high ceilings. The looms required headroom that domestic architecture didn't normally provide, which is why the canuts' houses look subtly different from the rest of Lyon.
The shop sells handwoven silk ties, scarves, and fabric cut from the looms. Guided tours (in French and English) run several times a day and are genuinely illuminating about the connection between Lyon's silk economy, the Jacquard card system, and the eventual development of computing.