The industrial landscape . As far as I know there is only one, so therefore I don't need to mention that it is the area with old decommissioned factories in Norrkoping that I mean? But can an old industrial area be beautiful? Yes. Actually. Very beautiful, even.
The area consists, among other things, of Holmens mills' former factory premises. Paper was produced there until the last paper machine stopped in 1986. That was a year before I moved from Norrkoping. Even then, the old industries were stately buildings, but most of them were worn, dirty, boarded up and abandoned. Industries had closed down and manufacturing had moved elsewhere. In most cases abroad.
But just a few years later, new life began to come into the old factory premises, many of which had been textile industries. Office jobs, the university, cultural activities and museums moved in. The premises were equipped both internally and externally. And in 1990, the term "industrial landscape" was born as a major asset for the city of Norrkoping.
A cultural heritage from the age of industrialism. Most of the remaining former factories had come into being in the period 1850–1920, but the industrial history of the area already began in the early 17th century. From the beginning, the factory wheels were powered by the power of Stommen's fall, but later the steam engines and the smoke came out of the chimneys.
At the beginning of the 1990s, a new hydroelectric plant was built, which hides a large part of the water flow in Strommen. In connection with that, the falls inside Norrkoping were redesigned, so that they would still give the viewer a sense of the power of the flowing water. And they really do!