The resources will go towards improving the energy efficiency and digitalisation of the Cal Granotes Tannery

The Igualada Leather Museum has received a grant of 550,000 euros from the Next Generation European funds to invest in the heritage facility of Cal Granotes, a former tannery dating from 1763 and the only tannery in Catalonia to have been turned into a museum.

The Cal Granotes project covered by the grant provides for the renewal of the museum displays, and resources will also be invested in works to make the building more environmentally efficient.

Cal Granotes is an emblematic building in the history of tanning in Igualada and in Catalonia. Opened to the public in 1990, the challenge 30 years on is to renew the museography with the potential of digital technologies, offering new possibilities for interactivity, experimentation, accessibility and a multiplication of the content that can be conveyed. There is also a desire to give the narrative added complexity, scope and breadth, through themes that broaden its dimension and deepen understanding of the leather trade, with concepts such as the circular economy, water availability and management, and sustainable fashion.

This project is approached from a cross-cutting perspective: it is more than a renewal of the museum displays; it is a project for the city, with cultural, social, urban planning and tourism implications. It is not merely a matter of updating a facility, but above all of connecting it with the neighbourhood and the city that explain its existence, and placing it at the service of the Rec neighbourhood and of Igualada, a city which, in the twenty-first century, is positioning itself as the capital of the leather sector in Catalonia and the home of the Catalan leather cluster: Leather Cluster Barcelona.

The renewal of the museum displays and the digitalisation of Cal Granotes will make it possible to improve the connection between the world of leather and new generations, and will enrich Catalonia's leather ecosystem.

Leather Cluster Barcelona is an environment of competitive cooperation for promoting cross-cutting, transformative strategic projects with the aim of driving forward the ecosystem of the Catalan leather sector. The cluster is an accredited entity within the Catalonia Clusters programme and has the support of Acció.