I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to visit Bruges before it became completely Disney-fied by over tourism. Still, I never got to see the Belgian gem as viewed in these amazing Photochrom prints from the 1890s. This series of images is part of a wonderful collection available on the U.S. Library of Congress website.
Travel Between The Pages 
These great photos show Bruges as it was described by Georges Rodenbach in his novel Bruges-la-Morte, later made into a major opera, Die tote Stadt (The Dead City) by the German composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold. https://operasandcycling.com/the-dead-city/
Even now, Bruges is a beautiful place to visit. We spent a week there and saw so much away from the usual tourist places. You can easily avoid the crowds if you stay for a few days, because they all leave by mid-afternoon.