Transparent Factory
Coordinates: 51°02′40″N 13°45′20″E / 51.04444°N 13.75556°E
The Transparent Factory is an exhibition space in Dresden, Germany owned by German carmaker Volkswagen and designed by architect Gunter Henn. It originally opened in 2002 as car factory. In 2016, it reopened as a "showcase for eletromobility".
The original German name is Gläserne Manufaktur (meaning factory made of glass. Both the German and English names are a word play on the double meaning of transparent and glassy, referring to both optical transparency and transparency of the production process. It is .93 miles (1.5 kilometres)long .
The original purpose of the factory was the assembly of Volkswagen's luxury sedan, the Phaeton. It used 60,000 magnets in its fully automated assembly line. Spare capacity was also used to build Bentley Continental Flying Spur vehicles destined for the European market until 2006, when all work was transferred to Bentley's plant in Crewe, England. Production of the Bentley Flying Spur resumed in late 2013. The factory only handled final assembly. Operations such as stamping and welding and the painting of the steel bodies took place in Zwickau. Painted bodies arrived at the factory by truck. The other 1200 parts and 34 preassembled components were shipped to a logistics center and are transported to the factory by CarGoTrams that ran on Dresden's public transport tracks. All vehicle production at the factory ended in March 2016.
...
Wikipedia