The Fabrika Center in Svitavy is visited by more and more people each year

Svitavy - Within less than two years of its opening, the Fabrika community center in Svitavy is seeing an increasing number of visitors. The building, converted from the original textile factory from 1925, also received the Senate President's award last year for the best building intended for public use. The city is very satisfied with the use of the library, said Mayor Jiří Brýdl today during the plaque unveiling for Building of the Year 2009.
    "The number of visitors is increasing every year, even exponentially," he stated. The library particularly recalls the original industrial character of the building, with concrete pillars and exposed beams giving an impression of the former production hall.
    In the extensive facility in close proximity to the center, there are, in addition to the library, a congress and theater hall, spaces for community and club activities, a lecture room, language classrooms, the Salvia Social Services Center, a preschool center, a restaurant, a café, a pastry shop, and a second-hand bookshop. The corridors serve exhibition purposes, especially for photography displays.
    "Fabrika seems to happily concentrate many nearby activities, which attracts people. Compared to earlier times in other spaces, we have very decent attendance for jazz events, but more and more people are also attending senior events and others," said Petr Mohr, director of the Cultural Services Center of the city of Svitavy, which manages the building.
    Fabrika has been serving visitors since May 2008. It is not only an example of modern revitalization of an industrial facility but, according to some media, also a demonstration of problematic handling of public funds. The city received 97 million crowns from an EU grant and 19 million from the state for the reconstruction. However, the construction ended up costing 37 million crowns more, resulting in a total price of 185 million crowns excluding VAT, and Svitavy took out a loan for the repairs. According to Brýdl, the price increase was due to late-discovered structural disruptions and additional interior and kitchen modifications requested by the council.
    The city bought the building in 2005 for about 17.4 million crowns from local entrepreneur Josef Jindra, who is media-famous as a partner of Kateřina Neumannová. Jindra had purchased the same factory from Svitavy four years earlier for 4.5 million. The town hall defended the deal by stating that it was very interested in the building and that the European Union was willing to pay the acquisition price set by an expert.