The phenomenon of the nineteenth-century textile(1) factory is one of most interesting and complex chapters in the study of the industrial archaeological patrimony of the Schio area. The factory, as a system of economic power of the middle classes, became the new town-planning centre in the organisation of the area. It created a network of roads, social, welfare and recreational services, and imposed its new emerging architecture by dominating the pre-existing buildings for handicrafts and by establishing different relationships within the urban context. The agricultural landscape was progressively deprived of increasingly large areas given up to new establishments and employees’ dwellings, which eventually became entire workers’ neighbourhoods or villages. As the factory is a place where machines(2) are kept, it therefore adapts, renovates itself or declines according to the technology(3) connected with its production(4). Consequently it should be explored from the point of view of the architecture (materials and styles adopted, organisation of space, working models), machinery for the exploitation of energy sources and the creation of yarns(5) yarns and fabrics(6), fittings and products. It is the collective building par excellence, the workplace where employees and managers meet to exchange opinions. The factory is therefore a cultural vehicle which is able to transmit messages of various kinds and values to the masses.

by Bernardetta Ricatti