Ten years ago, founder Titia Punt of restaurant De Wolkenfabriek was the first to breathe new life into the rugged, abandoned grounds of the old sugar factory in Groningen. Now the owners of Paradigm nightclub have taken over her restaurant; they call it De Huiskamer. Titia Punt looks back. “We were the pioneers.”
It stuck everywhere. The syrup boilers of the sugar factory had been steaming for 95 years, so that the sweetness had drawn into the entire building. And lured countless wasps.
Titia Punt (46) smiles as Wildrik Moesker (53) talks about their acquaintance in 2013 with the sticky sieving building − together with the work building and the factory pipe, the only building that recalls the sugar factory that processed sugar beet from 1913 to 2008 on the outskirts of Groningen .
Her smile is one of regret, for stories of when they settled on that rugged terrain exude an enthusiasm that should never have ended if it were up to her.
She says, “I miss being here.”
And: ,,Do you know that video of how we started?”
Idea creator Titia wins municipal competition
She takes out her phone and shows it: with a group of friends and acquaintances, including supporters and children, they climb over the fences of the abandoned factory site, they storm it, they want to get to work.
Titia has just been declared one of the winners of the municipal competition that had called on people to come up with great plans for the old sugar factory. “I was tipped off by a friend who knew I had a lot of ideas,” says Titia. ,,He told me that I had to hand in those ideas for the Suikerfabriek terrain.”
Slide-in restaurant or Turkish bath?
She wanted to start a slide-in restaurant where cooks, caterers, jubilees and families could spend an evening and where guests and passers-by met at long tables. A city ice rink was also on her list of ideas, a Turkish bathhouse and a harbor.
It became the slide-in restaurant. What would that look like? Titia had no idea. “I just went into that factory building. Looking and feeling where in that huge space I would like to start that restaurant. There were no walls, huh. I could also have chosen the ballroom, you know: that space where bridal couples like to have themselves photographed and where those big techno parties are held.”
Wildrik says: ,,Titia just got the key to the factory.” He was at that key moment, because he and Titia had just started a relationship.
The world of squatters and bakmopeds
Titia Punt grew up in Zuidlaren and moved to Groningen to attend art academy Minerva. She painted, photographed, made visual work.
In the meantime, she got to know the squatters’ world through her group of friends from Minerva and later settled down in a caravan at the Betonbos caravan camp on the Eems Canal. She also opened a bar on the Kattendiep, a small version of De Wolkenfabriek avant la lettre.
As an artist who liked to jute urban waste, she cruised through the city on her moped for a while. “I think baking mopeds are fun,” she says. “With a cargo moped you can find and take building material very spontaneously. And you move very freely through the city, open and naked in the wind. You can always give someone a lift and you don’t have to wear a helmet!” She exchanged the cargo moped for a van. “I’m not very good at tinkering.”
She is not only known as an artist, but also as a furniture maker, idea creator and bartender.
A large group of Groningen residents reclaim the old factory site
Wildrik grew up in Spijk, came to Groningen to study social pedagogical work, worked with autistic people and sailed for twenty years on the brown fleet.
He got to know Titia better around the time she got the green light for her slide-in restaurant in the old sugar factory. She christened it the Cloud Factory.
,,We were the pioneers”, says Titia about herself and Wildrik. Together with about two hundred Groningen residents, they reclaimed the old factory site.
What did you have in mind 10 years ago?
,,We were with friends and volunteers: all caterers, musicians, builders and designers. A moving group of people, because acquaintances of acquaintances always joined. We were looking for a place where we could always get together and where other people would like to go and be able to go. We knew each other from festivals such as Noorderzon, De Parade, Lowlands and Hongerige Wolf. I was a tent builder there. The caterers had plenty of work in the summer, but less in the winter.”
What did the old factory site look like when you arrived?
“It was completely bare, no vegetation, nothing. Here and there on that plain we found tile floors and gullies that had been part of the largely demolished factory. The pipe was still there, of course, and that immense building, part of which was roofless. It was a cold, moldy shell.”
How did you start that job?
,,We started with a long table with chairs that we found somewhere in the city. At first we only served coffee, later soup and a sandwich and much later people could come here for meals and parties. We had no money, but we had people. Volunteers. And a lot of sense and energy. The Noorderlicht photo event was held in our building. There were many people who wanted something to eat and drink. They also got new ideas through the building.”
Ready for winter
After Noorderlicht, it was clear to Titia and Wildrik that they had to prepare De Wolkenfabriek for winter by demarcating the space. They built a wall of old windows and doors from the factory. Then they built a better wall and an even better one. They installed water, sewage and electricity.
,,We sometimes worked weeks of 70 hours,” says Wildrik, who says that their telephone number was on the fence near the ring road. How, when someone was at the gate, he grabbed his race bike and raced to the gate to let the visitors in.
“We were actually volunteers ourselves,” says Titia.
They built a kitchen. And without them having to make much effort, the barrel came in.
Very alternative Groningen came along?
,,Yes, at first only the adventurers came, but we invited everyone and everyone and we distributed flyers in the city. The more that happened on the site, the busier it became and the more mixed the audience: people who had worked in the sugar factory came by, but also people who were just curious about this place.”
How would you describe this place?
“Like open, poetic and rough. It reminds of an industrial age. The factory had many bricked up windows. At one point we opened the windows in the kitchen. That was a wonderful moment, because suddenly a kind of cathedral-like light came in.”
Improvised climbing and sliding paradise
The Wolkenfabriek was open every Sunday as a café-restaurant where a mix of visitors had a drink, played games and came to eat. The wood stove roared, children romped in a corner, in an improvised climbing and sliding paradise.
Wednesday and Thursday were added later. In addition, De Wolkenfabriek served as a meeting, party and inspiration location that was often rented.
Bands performed there, theater performances took place there, there were Christmas markets, weddings and the artists of Eurosonic Noorderslag found their home base there.
,,The Timmerdorp was here every year, the project Waste no Waste by artist Claudy Jongstra, the film events Zienemaan and Zienemini, the roller disco, ping pong parties, we had a blind dinner here, there were skate parties in the ballroom, the VPRO settled here with Backlight ” Titia sums up.
“It always felt like working for a good cause, for a nice place for the city, for people who came up with funny, crazy things.”
What was the highlight of De Wolkenfabriek for you?
,,That we were always so happy together, that we always managed to fix it and that we had a place where we saw each other again and again and where we saw all visitors get inspired. De Wolkenfabriek is not like the catering industry in the city center, does not have that raked and styled look. The Wolkenfabriek has emerged, is lively.”
You still sound enthusiastic about it, but you have said goodbye to De Wolkenfabriek and it has now changed hands. Why?
,,After 9 years I couldn’t afford it anymore. It was impossible to keep up, it’s a place that should be open every day. During corona we still wanted to do something and we set up the knapsack route, for example, but the period after corona broke us up. It was just as busy as before corona and we couldn’t manage it anymore.”
When did you say goodbye to De Wolkenfabriek?
“When we found someone who fits well with the atmosphere and has a heart for the loose and free of this place.”
What do you miss the most?
“You put so much energy into this. I am very sorry that De Wolkenfabriek is no longer ours, but it also gives me the chance to make another Wolkje. Somewhere in Groningen.”
The living room
De Wolkenfabriek on the site of the old sugar factory on the outskirts of Groningen will now be known as De Huiskamer. Until 2030, the municipality of Groningen has handed over the former factory site to pioneers, entrepreneurs and inventors. The municipality then determines what the destination of the factory site will be. A residential area is planned on the flow fields behind the old factory, in the direction of Hoogkerk.