A cultural heritage

The Linen Project aims to change and challenge thinking in a multidisciplinary way across fields and sectors – agriculture, history, heritage, (landscape)
architecture, fashion, food, crafts, design, contemporary art, economics, innovative business. After all, the whole world is changing. On the one hand, people are more digitally connected to each other than ever before. But at the same time, there is a growing interest in connecting to the products we use and consume every day and how they are made. How and where are our roots? How can we reconnect with deep human values and ancient knowledge and skills? The Linen Project explores the tradition of linen production in the Netherlands and drives the exchange of different values, knowledge, skills and competences across industry boundaries.

Learning by doing is the motto of the project: prototypes of new economic, social and cultural ecosystems are created in a dynamic environment, demonstrating the vital importance of (biological) diversity. The production process involves only four steps – the flax from 2019, for example, was grown on the Lingehof near Arnhem (NL), mechanically processed by Van de Bilt Zaden en Vlas in Sluiskil (NL), spun in Poland and woven into linen by Enschede Textielstad in Enschede (NL). In the process, “old” knowledge meets new technologies, so that future production is based on and builds on a restored connection between people and nature.