Borås Textile Museum

Boras, in central Sweden, has been an important textile centre since the sixteenth century, and in the nineteenth century specialised in the production of cotton, but one of the principal themes of its textile museum, opened in 1992, is the production of garments. There are displays of sewing machines and other materials used in making clothes, a model of a garment factory of 1949, and collections of products of such factories. Other exhibits include looms and spinning machines of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a steam engine, and a large collection of trade literature, as well as up-to-date interactive displays.

Boras continues to be an important textile centre. About half of the textiles now made in Sweden, most of them highly specialised, are produced in the vicinity, and Boras companies import yarn, fabrics and garments from overseas, and distribute the latter by mail order.