Warsaw’s gritty factories retooled into hip districts
WARSAW, POLAND — The space once housed weapons and motorbike factories. Today, it is Warsaw’s Soho Factory, a hip new space of exhibitions, offices and restaurants.
Taking inspiration from SoHo and the Meatpacking District in New York City, entrepreneur Rafal Bauer saw “soul” in a pile of dilapidated brick buildings in Warsaw’s gritty Praga neighbourhood and transformed them into a creative space whose spacious buildings and lower rents have attracted artists, architects and web designers.
It is now one of several former industrial spaces that have been transformed in recent years into enticing spaces across Warsaw as the Polish capital blooms after 25 years of economic growth.
“Nobody believed that you can start up your project with an old factory which lies in a very bad part of Warsaw, with a bad reputation — historically rather considered as a place not to go,” Bauer said. “And we managed to bring life here.”
Today, the revamped buildings in the area at 25 Minska St. house museums, art galleries, a trendy clothing shop, restaurants and architects’ offices, flanked by apartment buildings. Fashion shows, conferences and a photo exhibition featuring the work of a Chinese dissident have also been held there.
Originally, the space housed ammunitions factories that began production in 1925 and were significantly damaged in the German bombing of the city during the Second World War. After the war, the factories produced motorbikes and optical systems for tanks used by the communistera Polish army. They were then abandoned and fell into disrepair. When renovation of the area finally began in 2010, it was still a dumping ground for stolen cars in a crime-ridden district.
The creation of the Soho Factory area comes amid a larger gentrification of many other former rundown areas in Warsaw.