In the history of linen with Vaupel & Heilenbeck

Hi everybody there! Inspired by the review of a product posted q few days ago by one of our “busiest” customers – as well as a good friend of ours, by now – I’ve made the decision of writing this post. And I’m twice pleased in doing this, since a blog should exactly work like this: gathering impressions and sensations and take them as the starting point to go more in depth as for this or that item

In this case, the item is a linen band from Vaupel & Heilenbeck that Fatatulipano reviewed with satisfaction, though – and she did right, let’s make it clear, because we do believe that expressing one’s own opinion honestly and frankly is always the best choice! – underlining that the price of these bands is quite high.
And this is exactly what has inspired me, adding to my will to give you all one more reason, besides their top quality, for the price of these linens
And this is just the prologue of the story!
So, at the end of June, I was the lucky “correspondent” of CasaCenina to the yearly open day that Vaupel & Heilenbeck reserves to their retailers, at their headquarters in Wuppertal: 30 miles away from the German metropolis of Cologne… And I had the opportunity of experiencing exactly what’s behind these linen bands!
The weather was rainy and extremely cold – for the month of June – but anything else was just perfect and pretty thrilling! Most of all, that couple of days gave me the opportunity of understanding the reason why, in this case, paying a little more is definitely worth: and this is also why I’m glad to personally thank Fatatulipano for the inspiration she’s given me Actually, I must confess this post has been going on through my mind since then… But, being always so busy, I’ve simply kept on postponing it so far… So, thank you twice, Fatatulipano!
The fact is that, in a small corner up on the hills surrounding the picturesque Wuppertal (by the way, if you’re just going to Germany and are in the neighborhoods, visit this small town! Besides being an historical center of the famous North-European textile tradition, full of soft-pastel-color buildings that have miraculously survived World War II, including Friedrich Engels’ natal house, its amazing floating tram, running on a suspension railway along the river Wupper, is already worth the visit alone! Just think that it was inaugurated by Emperor William II, who had personally contributed to its project and realization, in 1901, and it still works today, moving over 70,000 passengers every day, riding on its typical carriages at 8 meters of height from the ground and 13 from the river!)… OK, I was saying that on the hills surrounding this lovely small town, in a building that seems everything but a factory (to be true, I would say it looks exactly like a house, instead!), there’s Vaupel & Heilenbeck “manufacturing plant”… And I’ve put these words in inverted commas, since its inside, too, seems everything but an industrial plant!!! One of the “oldest” masters of linen working for Vaupel & Heilenbeck, Mr. Klein, opened up the doors of this house, to let us discover a large hall “crowded” with ancient, wooden looms – oh yeah, you’ve read right: they’re fully made of wood! – all still perfectly working, with tatting shuttles hand-loaded with the linen threads that will be weaved into the linen bands we all know and love! And, again, all these looms are hand operated and serviced every day, thanks also to that know-how dating back in time and that has nowadays – unfortunately – become of a very few ones (like Mr. Klein), in our heavily industrialized world. The linen threads themselves (by the way, they all come from Italy!) are selected by hand, to perfectly “fit” the loom they’ll be processed on. Some of these astonishing looms date back to the second half of the 19th century and have been punctually working since then! Some others are more “recent”: and inverted commas are compulsory here, too, as we’re talking of machines developed at the beginning of 1900, anyway! In a few words, the whole production from Vaupel & Heilenbeck, is based on craftsmanship, as well as on prestigious threads coming from our country (which ranks first in the world, as for the quality of flax). And even though in their offices, V&H rely on modern PCs, they’re mainly dedicated to order management and logistics, as this family-run company exports worldwide and has to cope with modern technology in this sense. However, their peculiarity stays right here: they’ve managed to happily join ancient traditions and Third-Millennium logistics. And, believe me, this is not within anybody’s reach!
This is what the linen bands from Vaupel & Heilenbeck rely on: old-time craftsmanship, mastership and passion, matching the media of our time only when stringently necessary and, most of all, a heart still beating right in the center of the Old Continent… Where, as we all know (sob!), production costs are far from low… And this is partly the origin of the final price of these bands, which – hopefully – Fatatulipano and all of you might now love even more, after reading this post of mine, between the most pleasant travel memories and the “financial/joking” way


Hear from me soon and.. Happy stitching!