An urban explorer, friend of mine, once told me: “I don’t like to go far away looking for abandoned places, I just carefully observe what’s in my city and surrounding area.”
And so I did.
One day I took my motorbike and I toured the small streets hidden in a rural area … I remembered that I have seen a closed factory.
I passed as a child when I was going with my parents to eat in the restaurant neared by. From outside I could have sworn it was a school, instead it turned out to be a textile factory.
I notice the sign “sale” and an easy entry way, so a few days later, along with a friend who does urbex longer than me, we decide to enter.
The factory has two floors, very big, and with all machines in place, as if time had stopped.
Mainly, it produced coats work, in fact there are still intact patterns near a big roller machine, perhaps cutter or something.
In the basement we find an old mannequin, many boxes of buttons and thread of each color and gender.
What particularly intrigues me is an old Mercedes parked in front of the big door about to exit.
We find other ironing machines with funny old tin boxes of coffee … probably the factory, as all the equipment that we found inside, dates from the 80s.
We discover a room with old labels of the company, all made in Italy, with sea and sun umbrellas.
On the Internet, unfortunately, we do not have definite information about the place, so I rely on locals and ask news around. Finally I discovered that in addition to producing work clothes as gowns and suits, this also produced sportswear and vest for hunting, and you can still find the cartridge holder inside!
Unfortunately, the warehouse is empty, hanging there is nothing except the labels for the division of sizes, but in a shelf across the room are boxes, graphically very old, with an Alpine shirt, a kind of shirt in pieces … really curious, a checkered shirt, ’80 ‘s style, with all the pieces to fit inside, cuffs, collar, sleeves … I wonder if it was part of the production of this factory.
At the entrance we find Singer sewing machines, professional ironing machines, a small office with slippers still on the radiator, as if it waiting for the return of the secretary, bubbles and credit notes ready to go.
Boxes and bags full of clothes and coats, as if someone have to come and collect them in a short time.
Above the office there is a staircase that goes to the caretaker’s house, or at least I think, totally emptied.
From the information that I found around, I learned that the owner died and none of his family wanted nothing to do with this factory.
Too bad no one wants to learn more about this little gem of made in Italy! For us is the memory of what it could be … the small factory along seaside.
Marianna has been exploring for many years with her partner Mirco, she found in urbex the possibility to unite travel, photography and writing. Her passion are the abandoned churches, especially in the center of Italy. She is a 360° artist, in love with extreme wide-angle lenses.
