FROM TEXTILE MILL TO ART MUSEUM
In 1977, the more than a cen­tury-old Brandts Klæde­fab­rik closed, and the build­ings stood empty until 1982. In 1981, two mer­chants from Jut­land pur­chased the tex­tile mill.In 1982, by agree­ment with the Odense mu­nic­i­pal­ity, the two mer­chants from Jut­land fi­nanced the ren­o­va­tion of the pub­lic part. The mu­nic­i­pal­ity was given the op­tion of pur­chas­ing parts of the large ex­hi­bi­tion build­ing – an op­tion used in 1995, when it ac­quired the pub­lic area of the build­ing com­plex.The cul­tural in­sti­tu­tion now named Brandts was founded in 1987 in an old in­dus­trial build­ing com­plex under the name of Brandts Klæde­fab­rik (Brandt’s Tex­tile Mill) as Den­mark’s first in­ter­na­tional cen­tre of art and cul­ture. Today, Brandts also houses an Ed­u­ca­tional Cen­tre, spe­cial­iz­ing in com­bin­ing art and ed­u­ca­tion, and Brandts Butik, the only art book­store on the is­land of Funen.