Open-Air Museum of Ukrainian Culture in Svidník

Svidník is a town in Eastern Slovakia close to the Polish and Ukrainian borders. I have visited this town when I was a child, but my husband hasn't been to this region yet, so we decided to explore it when we visited my aunt who lives in Bardejov. She lost her husband to cancer last year, and we take every opportunity to visit her now. This time we spent 3 days with her which were filled with activities and lots of food and laughter. We had a great time!

We planned to go to Svidník early in the morning, but as usually we were not that fast and left just before lunchtime. It was a hot day, so we didn't want to roam the city and decided to go to The Open-Air Museum of Ukrainian Culture instead.

It's a museum which consists of traditional cottages that you can visit and learn about local traditions and culture. The museum is situated on top of a hill and we realized that we could park there after we got there by foot. I don't remember when was the last time that I was sweating so much, but let's not go into too much detail 🙂

There were no other visitors when we arrived, but we could see a bus with tourists parking at a location nearby, so we took some photos of the complex before going inside of the cottages. It's good that we did so as the area was full of tourists in no time.

The museum resembles a small village with everything what was necessary in the past. You can find there cottages, a church, a school, a mill, a blacksmith, a tavern, granaries and much more.

It opened in 1982 after relocation of all buildings from their original locations. Today, it shows us the living conditions of Slovak Ukrainians in the past. Even to this day, all the road signs in Svidník are written in both Slovak and Ukrainian. The oldest construction in the museum dates back to the 17th century.

We were in desperate need of some drinks, so our first steps led us to the tavern. We were offered some beer or soft drink, but there is no fridge, so we were expecting somehow warm drinks. However, this old stone house has great thermoregulation and it was chilly inside, so our drinks had a perfect temperature.

The tavern was decorated with traditional clothes and items needed for harvest. There were also period photos hanging on the walls.

On this side we could see clothing of a village boy.

And on this side we could see clothing of a village girl with a rake which was needed to place hay in dedicated spots. I remember when my grandma and grandpa were bringing tons of hay from our fields. They layered it in a big pile and we climbed on the roof of their shed and jumped on it. I remember it being soft even though now I can't imagine that it was pleasant for my skin to jump into dried grass. I got bitten once by a garden snake hiding in the pile and this was the last time that I ever jumped on it. I'm scared of snakes ever since.

After we finished our drinks we started our tour by going inside of cottages. Most of the cottages have either one or two rooms. One room is residential and the other room (if there) was used to store material, tools, grains, etc. This cottage belonged to a poor farmer family and it only has one room. This means that the farmer had to lend all materials and tools for their work from wealthier families.

It was a charming room that was used as the living room, the bedroom and the kitchen at the same time. My aunt remembers this kind of stove from my grandparents house. They used to live in a clay house too until they were relocated and asked to build a brick house instead. My mom was a baby, so she doesn't remember much from this time, but it was interesting to go through this museum with my aunt as she recognized so many items and explained to us how they were used.

Here we can see a cottage from the late 19th century with beautiful straw roof. It has two entrances, and it also looks bigger than the former one. Let's get closer...

Pottery is my passion, and I'm always happy to see such old pieces. In the past it was common to hang them on the fence like this. It was used for milk or beer.

I don't remember the name of the plant, but my aunt mentioned that they used to suck the nectar out of its flowers as kids. Apparently it is delicious, and no, I didn't try 🙂

There were many windows in this cottage which is unusual for such houses. Today, we love to get a lot of light inside of our rooms, but in the past in was impractical. The cold was coming through the windows in winter and in summer there was too much heat.

My mom used this kind of crib for my younger sister. I remember it as it was so big that it took big part of our room.

People were living simple lives which can be seen on their utensils as well. They didn't have tap water, but had to take water from wells. Personal hygiene was almost non existent and the clothes were washed in ice cold creeks. We are so lucky with what we have today.

The second room was used for fabrics production. The family used to make carpets as well, you can see one of them on the left side.

Separate granary was one of the signs of wealth...

There are still sheep in this stall. They were grazing the grass nearby and I didn't go inside as it didn't smell well...

Most of the clay cottages are blue. I tried to look for some information about it, but I didn't find anything. I wonder if it was in fashion at that time. Let's go inside!

You can see that this room is not as fancy as the other ones. It belonged to a peasant family. Look at the floor - I always thought that it was a special clay mix, but I learned from my aunt that it's a normal clay found everywhere. It was soaked in water and pressed on the floor. There is a rough layer at the bottom with less water which is topped with a finer layer that was mixed with lots of water. It turned sturdy when it dried. You only needed clay and water if there were any repairs needed. And kids loved to help as who doesn't like playing with clay, right?

Another part of the exhibition shows wooden cottages.

This is one of the newest houses as it dates to the beginning of the 20th century, just before the World War II. It has two rooms, storage space under the roof and basement that can be reached from the right side of the gangway. The house was decorated with geraniums which were common at that time. Some people still grow them, but not as much as in the past.

This is the first house with wooden floors and small carpets for comfort. There is even a mirror which was a luxury as mirrors were expensive.

There is also a kitchen cabinet for the utensils. They still used the old stove, but they didn't use it for storage anymore.

This house had a separate dining room. Can you see that tool in the middle of the bench? It was used to make butter.

I can imagine sitting on the gangway with my matcha latte...

The entrance to the basement which is basically a dark hole. It was so cold even though it was 35 degrees outside, so it must have been used for food storage.

This peasant homestead consists of multiple buildings. It was the largest construction that we saw there. It even had a large gate which means that they owned a carriage and animals.

My aunt remembers ironing with this kind of iron. You filled it with hot coals and were ready to go. It sounds too dangerous to me, so I'm grateful for our modern iron 🙂

Homemade bread was a must. They were large and one piece of bread was enough for a meal.

I remember such pillows and blankets. They are filled with feathers and so heavy. I couldn't move in bed when I was staying over at my grandma's place.

There are many museums like this one across Slovakia. It is interesting to visit more of them as the culture and traditions differed between regions.

I admire the craftmanship of that generations as these houses were built with no nails...

This was the most pleasant part of our visit as there was some shade and a creek. It's a miller's homestead dating back to the 19th century. It was specialized in corn milling.

The homestead has the best views!

It also included a small granary to store grains and corn.

Interior was spacious, but rather simple. There was one room which was used as a waiting room for people waiting for fresh flour.

We are slowly coming to the end of our tour, but first we will visit the school and the church.

Entrance of the school is decorated with geraniums...

This was a typical classroom with benches and kids sitting next to each other...

The view from the school is not bad...

Let's go to the church! It was originally built in Nová Polianka in 1766 and it's still used for celebrations.

There is a bell tower in front of the church and we could ring the bells too!

This is an orthodox church and even the entrance is decorated with typical tower...

The wooden iconostas is from the 18th century and it's decorate with traditional gold and red colors.

We enjoyed the museum, but it was time to go back to Bardejov to get ready for our evening programme. Little did we know that our plans will change unexpectedly, but I will tell you about it another time.

Thank you for reading!

Cheers,
Martina