On Tuesday I decided to make use of another fine 'late summer' day for a visit to our open air museum park with old buildings reminding of the history of this area (not just Borås city, but also the surrounding countryside). With the covid situation, it's been at least two years since I was there last, I think.
Since my 2nd covid jab (end of June), I'm feeling a little bolder about using the bus again. I took the same bus as on Monday (the one that continues out to the big lake), but only a few stops this time. That saves me the most boring part of the walk (and with the most traffic).
I had checked the museum's opening hours online, and had got the impression that they were still offering some guided tours this week. But it turned out they did not, as the main tourist season is considered over (schools open again since 1-2 weeks). However, the member of staff who I asked about it (a young girl in her twenties or so) said that if there was any building I wanted to have a closer look at she'd be happy to open up and give me a little info anyway. As she added that she really had nothing special to do at the moment anyway, I took her up on her offer. So I ended up having a guided tour anyway - not of the whole park, but of some of the buildings. We also had quite an interesting chat about history and what life was like back then - long before our own times. (My contribution was some bits and pieces from my own family history research + a book I read back in spring, the diary of a man who was contemporary with my grandfather's grandfather.)
The buildings in the museum park were all collected from different places and moved to this park at the beginning of the previous century.
This is an old farm house which served as a kind of centre for "cottage industry" in the past; a business form that was quite common around here before they started building factories. Rich farmers and others who had a bit of capital bought and provided the material; while poorer people living in small cottages did the weaving and sewing etc in their own homes. ("Working from home" is far from a new idea!) And then peddlers went around from house to house (and town markets etc), selling the finished products.
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| The kitchen inside the farmhouse. |
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| Tile stove in the big dining/living room |
The cottages where most people lived were a lot simpler than the big farm houses, though.
In this type of cottage the main living space was the low part in the middle. The lofts on the parts to the sides were used for storage + sometimes people slept up there in summer. These cottages, including the keyhole entrances were common in provinces south or south-west of here.
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| Inside the cottage above |
The doorway of this one is so low that I refrained from trying to crawl in for a closer look... (Not feeling all that flexible any more - if I ever was!) I just took a photo looking in:
This used to be a parish hall. (We did not go into this one either.)
In the museum's main building (above) they had a summer exhibition which included some old paintings of peddlers from the past.
This used to be an inn. The ground floor here is still used as a café.
I sat down for a while and had a cup of tea and a piece of home-made pie with vanilla sauce before walking back home.
View from the café towards the church. The church was open too, and yes, I also went inside. But I think I'll save those photos for another post. :)
10 comments:
What a stunning and peaceful place! Do you know the reason for the low doorway? The old farmhouse in an earlier photo, what an awesome and intricate entryway! The stove looks surrounded by beautiful marble. The dining room is huge. Here, many years ago, that was common. But nowadays dining rooms are very small or else nonexistant. The grass roofs are like out of a fanasy tale or a fairy tale.
I'd live there, really nice houses and that pie with your drink looks good. I really like how good the inside rooms of the houses look.
I love such museums! We have some over here, too, but I have yet to persuade O.K. to go with me. We call them Freilicht-Museum, and they are usually a collection of buildings brought together from other parts of the area, just like yours.
Looking at how people used to live back then always makes me greatful for my comfortable, clean flat with central heating and hot water for showers, my washing machine and all the rest!
So glad you braved the bus and got hugs tour whether they were having them or not how cool is that? And I do love love love that little porch. And those buildings and the grass on the roof absolutely amazing old buildings
Ginny, I suppose they saved timber by keeping the walls low in the first place. I think the guide also mentioned something about the low doorways serving a safety purpose. (No one can just come storming in if they have to crouch to get through the door.) I can also imagine keeping the door openings small also helped keeping it warm indoors in winter.
Amy, I think most of us would really miss our modern conveniences if we tried living in the old types of cottages - especially in winter...
Meike, I react much the same way - and that's one reason why I think it's good to visit places like this now and then - bringing history to life, and making us wonder how our ancestors managed it.
Sandra, it's a reminder of "times past" and I was happy I went. It was also really nice to have a chat with that guide.
I always love seeing old ways of life particularly from countries other than my own (which I can see any time I want). I've seen bits of the museum before but this time I was particularly struck by the similarity of your 'cottage industry' and the similarity with the weavers of Harris Tweed in the Hebrides right up until the present day.
Graham, I remember reading about that in one of Peter May's books. Actually some types of old cottages here also remind me a bit of your blackhouses, even if yours have stone walls and ours were timbered.
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