Ústí nad Orlicí
Ustí nad Orlicí is a small town situated in the Eastern part of Bohemia (Pardubice Region), located in a valley between two rivers and surrounded by forests.
The expansion of the textile industry and the engineering production came in the middle of the 19th century linked to the construction of the main railway connecting Prague and Moravia.
At that time the town became to be called the East Bohemian Manchester. In 2009 the factory finished its activities and closed down, since then the spaces have been abandoned, buildings deteriorated and the area has become a brownfield.
Over the recent years, the town has invested its resources to rebuilt and revitalize the area. New galleries, public spaces for artists, young generation meeting points, textile museum are to be created.Thanks to characteristics of the place and its links to the textile production we have chosen this location for the second artwork installation. This place represents a high potential for awareness raising campaign regarding the sustainable behaviour in clothing and textile.
Textile industry has always had extremely heavy impact on the environment, consumption of water resources, suffered with inconvenient and unhealthy conditions of workers. Over the past decades, the production of textile materials has been delocalised to the developing countries which creates inequalities between the global North and South, but also impacts the carbon emissions due to transport. That is why the research in textile field has been inventing and introducing new technologies and advanced textile materials. One of them “Clevertex” developed directly in Usti nad Orlici.