Toulouse

City with characteristic architecture, Toulouse is nicknamed the "pink city" because of the color of the traditional local building material, brick clay. Another nickname is the "City of Violets". There was a Brotherhood of the Violet in Toulouse, where the production of this flower was very important. La Violette is now one of the awards awarded by the Academy of Floral Games of Toulouse.

The cradle of Airbus, Toulouse is today a European technopole which brings together many leading industries in aeronautics, computer science and space, as well as numerous research institutes. It is a student city, the fourth largest in France with 94,000 students, equipped with prestigious cultural facilities such as the congress center, the José-Cabanis media library, the Zénith, the Abattoirs museum of modern and contemporary art, the Cité de l'Espace or the Théâtre national de Toulouse (TNT).

The pink city is experiencing very strong demographic growth, the highest in France and even the highest in Europe among the agglomerations with more than 850,000 inhabitants, and is considered one of the major European intermediary cities such as Lyon, Marseille, Florence, Hamburg or Zurich.

If population growth continues at the current rate, its agglomeration will soon enter the circle of French agglomerations of more than a million inhabitants, and could then dethrone Nice and then Lille.

In 2005 a study ranks second French city (behind Nantes) for its quality of life according to a list of well-defined criteria.

Toulouse is the European capital of the aeronautical and space industry with the sites of Airbus and its parent company Airbus Group. It has more than 100,000 students9 and according to L'Express this was the most dynamic city in France in 200910. The economic magazine Challenges renews this title in 201211 and 201512.

The emblematic sport of Toulouse is rugby union, its club Stade toulousain holds the richest record on the national as well as the continental level, with 19 titles of champion of France and 4 titles of champion of Europe.

Cassoulet and sausage are the emblematic specialties of Toulouse gastronomy.