The artisan weavers of Can Morató of Pollença

In 2022, when the Can Morató factory was still in ruins, I published a work on its founding and especially on the female workers in the book Women, work and labor movement. Europe, Spain, Balearic Islands (1868 - 1936), coordinated by David Ginard. And now, as Can Morató is about to finish its restoration, I thought it appropriate to offer a summary. The factory was another milestone of that definitively lost industrial Mallorca. In Palma, mat factories like La Alfombrera had already existed for years, opened in 1882 by the Vidal family and dedicated to industrial carpets made with steam-powered looms. In 1885, the Mora factory opened in Santa Catalina, which was artisanal, for tapestries and carpets. Therefore, there was already a demand for mats for internal consumption and export many years before the Pollença factory opened. Labor legislation that prohibited child labor in factories and protected the working mother was not being followed. This was a scourge that affected textile enclaves like Sóller, Esporles, Bunyola and Palma. At La Alfombrera in Palma, and in many workshops, as complained about by La Vanguardia Balear on April 7, 1917, many girls under ten years old were working.

Pere Bosch Oliver, founder of Can Morató, was the secretary of the Esporles City Council and in 1882 he built, on land owned by his wife, Maria Cabot, a mechanized wool blanket factory, which he directed for many years and which had its moment of splendor thanks to the demand for blankets for the Spanish army during the colonial wars in Cuba and the Philippines. In Esporles, Pere Bosch, between 1909 and 1912, came into contact with Rafel Morató Font, a young industrial engineer born in 1886 in the Principality, who had set up artisanal wool rug workshops in the town and whom Maria, the heiress of the manufacturer Bosch, would eventually marry. Around 1912 a crisis occurred and as a result, the two great blanket manufacturers, Joan Riutort and Pere Bosch, sold their factories in Esporles.

It seems that Morató had a growing demand for his artisanal carpets, which led Bosch to associate with him and found the factory in Pollença, because, once the European war was over, markets were opening up to quality artisanal products with the elite consumerism of the roaring twenties. Furthermore, the handmade rugs had zero cost in fixed capital and machinery, and labor costs were low due to the cheapness of female wages. In 1922, the Can Bosch rug factory was inaugurated in Pollença, which would later be called Can Morató. The two manufacturers first carried out trials in workshops they opened in a space in the old convent of Sant Domingo in Pollença, as a way of ensuring labor with artisanal skill. Thus, in those workshops, a group of women learned the craft of weaving rugs. The factory was located at the entrance to the town along the road to the Port, attached to the Sant Jordi stream, and the entrepreneurs had their family residence built there, attached to it. The company produced a wide variety of refined design wool rugs that were processed entirely at the factory, from when the raw wool arrived, was washed, spun, dyed, and until it was woven. The factory had its own designers and produced luxury carpets that were exported to Barcelona, Santander, Bilbao, San Sebastian, and very soon they expanded the demand to the United States, Germany, and England.

Around 1930, Pere Bosch's son-in-law, Rafael Morató, replaced him in the management of the company, which in the early 30s already had 280 spindles and 11 hand looms. Rafael Morató, who in 1930 was the main taxpayer residing in the town, was a councillor of the City Council during the Republic for the Republican Centre Party, the republican reconversion of the old Liberal Party, dominated by Joan March. During the Civil War, blankets and wool sacks were produced at the factory for the national army. In 1960, the factory closed due to Morató's death and the competition for labour demand from the tourism sector.

The artisanal production of wool rugs took advantage of female labor that adapted perfectly to a job that did not require great physical effort but did require a certain skill. Furthermore, the women of Pollença had experience in the textile industry, as since the beginning of the 20th century they had been working cotton in the workshops opened by Martí Pons, which during the First World War had become a factory, installed on Ferragut street, with electric looms in which they manufactured canvas cloth. As was recurring, textile employers preferred female labor because the salary was close to half that of men and they also employed a good number of girls. In the early 30s, the owner of Can Morató had increased the number of looms and workers, who reached a hundred. Normally, the manual looms occupied about 25 women and girls who helped as winders, in addition to the spinners and the men who worked the dyeing. The dyers and the managers were usually men, with a status and a salary much higher than theirs. It was the factory that provided the most work in the town and oral testimonies still remember how its sirens organized the life of Pollença.