The home of the creative

From riches to rags and back in Timişoara, the European Capital of Culture 2023

FABER is an independent cultural centre, founded by a group of entrepreneurs from Timişoara in the fields of architecture, IT and social-cultural work. Confidence in the potential of Timişoara and the desire to contribute to the success of the creative industries in the city brought them together in 2017, and they decided to purchase the former industrial warehouse in the AZUR complex and transform it into the FABER building.

Located on the banks of River Bega in the Fabric District of Timişoara, the FABER building in its present form and function is the result of the transformation and rehabilitation of an industrial building whose development began almost 200 years ago, at the initiative of the Farber family (after 1990 the family incorporated its newly denationalized Romanian assets with their US-based ICC Industries Inc.). The former Azur factory represents another source of inspiration for the FABER team and showcases the creative-entrepreneurial history and identity of the city.

The name originates from the philosophical concept of “Homo Faber” – the creative man – an idea proposed by Hannah Arendt and Max Scheler, which posits man as capable of changing his environment by means of tools. FABER is where any talent with a dream or plan can find the required infrastructure and/or community to help them develop what they have imagined. It is both a place of inspiration and creation.

Since the inauguration of the building in 2020, the FABER team has also become a creator of socio-cultural, visual, experimental, artistic, and musical content. In 2023, the year when Timișoara was the European Capital of Culture, FABER served as a reference space, often in partnership with the Polytechnic University of Timișoara.

Winners of the past and future, too

FABER received international recognition shortly after its inauguration. In the New European Bauhaus 2020 awards, the FABER building was among the three European finalists in the “Buildings Renovated in the Spirit of Circularity” category. In the same year, its architects – F-O-R Arhitectură & Urbanism, also residing in the building – were nominated for the Mies Van Der Rohe Prize, and in 2022 received an award at the BETA Architecture Biennale.

Around 20 companies and teams of freelancers from the creative industries – including architecture, design, 3D production, textile and music production, content creators, and more – operate in the FABER building. Cultural organisations and companies also come to FABER to make use of a creative space suitable for hosting their own medium and large events.