Have you been to Łódź in Poland? The once-hardy industrial heartland of Poland has quickly grown out of its rust-filled roots to become one of the most rapidly evolving areas of the country. Rocking to the rhythm of high-speed development, the city is alive with a vast choice of cultural landmarks and activities, creative spirit as well as optimism and opportunity in establishing diversified businesses and retail services.

For most of the last two centuries, Łódź was synonymous with smoke stacks, intense smog and a thrusting forest of red-brick factories that drew mainly overall-clad workmen and their extended families. But as the giant generator of economic wealth started to lose steam, the city slowly blossomed out of its architectural wasteland to become culturally and economically thriving metropolis full of life and high-tech commerce.

The history of Łódź, summed up in one sentence, would tell of how a small farmer settlement grew into the hub of industrial activity in Poland and how, over the past two decades, the city reinvented itself as a new-age model of forward-thinking economic development. But the colorful history of Łódź deserves a more tuneful telling.

The site of Łódź has been inhabited, more or less, for several thousand years but the first written record dates back to 1332 when the village of Łodzia was given to the bishops of Włocławek. Positioned in the middle of Poland near the crossing of the Odra and Vistula Rivers, the settlement was established on the important Masovia-Silesia trade route, although agricultural activities were main source livelihood for the local provincial community. The town’s municipal privilege was granted by King Wladyslaw Jagiello in 1423 and for the following centuries, this small settlement of around 800 inhabitants lived off of the surrounding farmlands. At the cusp of the 19th century, with the second partition of Poland, the city came under the control of Prussia and it was named Lodsch, but it was soon reunited with its motherland to become part of the Russian-controlled Congress Poland in 1815.

Despite being destined for slow decay, the aging industrial sites and structures where spotted by city officials and a slew of forward-thinking foreign and local investors as vital part of designing Łódź’s post-communist identity and urban regeneration. Combining monumental and cultural preservation with urban renewal and artistic flair, a number of abandoned factories have been given a new lease of life as cultural centres and mix-used commerce and leisure parks.

Examples of this large-scale urban revival can be seen across the city. The four-storey White Factory of Saxony industrialist Ludwik Geyer, a brick-and-stone cotton spinning and weaving mill erected in 1830, received a much-need facelift in the 1950s and became the headquarters of the Central Museum of Textiles in 1960. The museum hosts the International Tapestry Triennale and features a comprehensive selection of industrial textiles and tapestries from across the globe as well as organizing. New life was also breathed into the brick-built spinning mill and neo-Renaissance residential palace of “Cotton King” Karol Scheibler, as it houses Poland’s only Cinematography Museum since 1986. The posh premises survived the wartime period, serving as the Gestapo Chief’s main residence, and the varied architectural styles where left intact, which now serve as a lavish backdrop to the myriad of permanent and temporary exhibits highlighting Poland’s colourful cinematic past. In the vicinity lies Edward Herbst’s neo-Renaissance-style mansion, also known as the Priest’s Mill Residence, and the adjoining greenhouse, Ballroom and maintenance building. In 1976, the Łódź Museum of Art acquired this stylish space and after extended restoration work it was opened to the public in 1990. The conservatory works and the display arrangements in the Herbst Mansion won Poland’s first Europa Nostra medal, awarded for outstanding preservation of cultural heritage by the pan-European Federation for Cultural Heritage.

With nearly 800,000 inhabitants, Łódź is Poland’s second-largest urban agglomerate and one of its chief investment areas. Its central location (some 120 kilometers southwest of Warsaw), long-standing industrial traditions, well-developed technical infrastructure and the availability of trained personnel are just a few of the attractive qualities that wooed international investors to the city. In 1997, the Decree of the Council of Ministers established the Łódź Special Economic Zone (SEZ) which offers a variety of high-value properties in the province, significant tax reliefs and all-around assistance in the investment process. Within ten years of its existence, the Łódź SEZ has attracted dozens of global brands and multi-national enterprises which invested over 1 billion Euros and have created 10 000 new jobs.

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)