Hello Hat Lovers! We love history, and multiple times we encountered the old story from Latvia about Limbažu Cepuru Fabrika. And we actually went for a short road trip over there to see it with our own eyes! So the short story is- starting from 1876. A new factory of producing wool and later Hats emerged, and it was going great! Had 500 employees, supported and pushed the industry in the whole city. Years passed, the company was acquired by different owners, and eventually became government owned, and stopped making hats in the 50s, and in 1992 went down the drain. And here comes the biggest pain! The place went bankrupt at 1992, but the building are in very poor shape unfortunately. Personally this is always a really big pain about these heritages latvians, or anyone else has destroyed collectively. No matter, industrial, or natural. It is just shit, when you had something built over long period of time and then completely destroyed by one generation, while the next generation would have enjoyed and cherished it so much!
But Let's focus on the good things! That this thing happened, that there was an amazing industry, that there were craftsmans who worked hard and created something huge! And just a quick math - at 1897. the population of the city was 2412 inhabitants, and the factory had 500 employees. So basically every household was part of this industry! So anyway! We love this fact, we would love to meet someone who has memories from working here, or some knowledge or equipment. Love history, appreciate heritage. Don't f*ck up sh*t for the next generations ;) Whether it is cutting down forests for short term profit, or letting century old building be unused and degrade into oblivion!
Big Thanks to Biedrība Limbažu filcs and Limbažu muzejs for keeping the good job of reviving some of the building!
