Gradually the project developed and in 2011 it became the «Canvas Bag».

The Fabric Laboratory celebrates its birthday this month 11 years in business. We are happy to have arrived here and thank you for your support all this time!

In the 11 years of business we have encountered both opportunities and obstacles, but let’s briefly look back at how these years have worked out for us. The project started in 2009 under the name of «Canvas bag»with 3 employees, an environmental mission (offering an alternative to plastic bags), a social mission (integrating disabled people into the world of work) and a single production line (canvas bags). At the beginning the bags we made contained our graphics (at the time we didn’t have collaborations with artists). The space in which we operated was very small, but this did not discourage us, on the contrary it made us ambitious and we worked hard to grow and convince as many people and companies as possible to choose our environmentally friendly product

Gradually the project developed and in 2011 it became the «Canvas Bag».

«The fabric laboratory»and the social enterprise obtained the status of in 2014 protected unit of the ViitorPlus association. The work team has increased, and in addition to the line of bags made of 100% raw, undyed and untreated cotton fabric, since 2015 we have added a production line – Puzzletex line (which consists of creating new products starting from pieces of textile materials left in the suppliers’ warehouse, a concept also known as «circular economy»).

In addition to the new production line, we have worked intensively on the development of the model range for canvas bags. So, in the autumn of 2016, we organized a competition called RE-Creation (a cultural project funded by the Ministry of Culture), through which we encouraged young artists to register with a graphic template. 126 young creatives with wonderful ideas participated in the competition to embellish canvas bags and come up with creative options for transforming textile waste into new functional products. The designs closest to our cause and our message were awarded and 10 of the artists’ graphics can still be found on our bags today: discover the complete collection here.

Things were going well, the workshop was recovering and many companies chose to purchase products from us, taking advantage of the tax breaks they had to support the activities of the protected units. This happened until 2017, when the Law on the benefits granted to protected units was changed, and our workshop was affected by these changes. 2017 was the year in which we practically had to change tactics and think of a new strategy through which to continue to support the activity and missions we proposed. Unfortunately this year we had to leave part of our team and we believe this was the toughest test. Although the situation was not good at all, we did not give up and in 2018 we became exclusive suppliers of IKEA tailoring services, and since 2019 we have been able to expand our work team, partnerships and product range.

In 2019 and early 2020 we were present at more events than ever, we participated in several fairs and handbag painting workshops, which made us happy.

And when things were going well, in March 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, we had to change strategy again and rethink the entire production process. In the first phase we made sure that we had adopted all the measures imposed by the specialists to be able to continue our activity, then we looked for solutions with which we could help hospitals and the most vulnerable people. We initially donated 1,000 masks and with the help of several companies we donated a total of 2,480 masks. Since there was still a need (many people wrote to us that they would have liked to be able to order masks from us), we began to think deeply about this product line and so, after several tests and analyses, we created 2 models of masks that you can also find today in our shop, in multiple variations of colours, models and sizes: product-category/reusable-masks/.
Even though masks were our first concern, we didn’t forget the cotton bags either. Therefore, we continued to expand the graphic models and completed 3 collaborations (which we are very happy with). These are partnerships stipulated with: This is the price, Stephen AND Raluca Marino (you can find the bags in the category «Bags with artistic prints» from the online shop).

This is what 11 years of activity look like for us in brief. We promise not to stop here and to continue to surprise you with our products. If you want to know more about us, don’t forget that you can find us on the following platforms: