Voiron

Sister cities

• Bassano del Grappa
• Tarragona
• Herford
• Šibenik
• Droitwich Spa

History

Voiron had been a part of the County of Savoy in the Middle Ages. In the Treaty of Paris (1355) the count exchanged Voiron and the rest of the region between the rivers Rhône and Isère (watered by the Guiers Mort) for Faucigny and Gex from France. In 1700, the capital of the Chartreuse massif and its surrounding area had about 1,200 inhabitants and more than a hundred of them worked in the processing of hemp. Since the beginning of the century, production had been organized around the Voironnaise factory and canvases were marked to certify their origin. The city acquired a great reputation thanks to its paintings resulting from a secular know-how. The privileges granted by Louis XII disappeared during the French Revolution. However, the production of canvas continued, and their reputation allowed Voiron to maintain this activity under the First Empire due in large part to purchases by the army. The nineteenth century saw the decline of the era of canvas in Voiron because of the scarcity of linen and cotton, and because of the disappearance of the sailing navy which had been a large consumer of canvasses. Voiron came to be known for its fine silks, sought after by European royalties. Voiron then benefited from a female workforce, housed at the factory and often poorly paid. Voiron also gained religious influence marked by the 1876 erection of the Saint-Bruno church of neo-Gothic style by a first magistrate. A statue representing the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus, a tribute to Notre-Dame-de-France Puy-en-Velay, was also erected. The company Skis Rossignol was founded in 1907 by Abel Rossignol. Entire families of Voiron, along with Italian immigrants who arrived en masse at the beginning of the century, worked in these factories. On the eve of the First World War,…

Geography

The city is located northwest of Grenoble and southeast of Lyon. Voiron is at an altitude of , on the Morge (a tributary of the Isère).