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Sirogojno - village on Mt. Zlatibor in west Serbia. "Sirogojno" - the name known all over the world for its hand made woollen jumpers which have been designed by Dobrila Vasiljevic-Smiljanic for thirty years and knitted by Zlatibor peasant women. This traditional art and craft of knitting has been recognised all over the world as a timeless fashion. The "Old Village" Museum is an evident effort have done to preserve, protect and revive the tradition. |
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EVERYBODY IS WELCOME TO SIROGOJNO |
The traditional art of buildings in this region is exceptionally characteristic. The Mt. Zlatibor log cabin represents the most accomplished form of traditional Serbian housing within the Dinaric Mountain Range. The old buildings that have survived were fashioned with great craftsmanship and illustrate the skill and art achieved by our people in costructing houses to suit their needs and their sense of beauty. Life was organised in large families - cooperatives with strictly imposed rules and traditional ways of behaviour, with special respect for mutual relationships, rights and duties demanded various kinds of buildings and their proper location within the homestead. As a rule the Zlatibor homestead is situated on specially chosen suuny sloping terrain protected from the winds. The highest point is reserved for the house and a few cottages - the dwellings and other accompanying buildings used for food storage. The lower levels harbour the stables, pig sties and sheep pens and a little further down we can find orchards, fields and vegetable gardens.
The open air "Old Village" ("Staro selo") Museum at Sirogojno represents the village dwelling culture on Mt. Zlatibor. To save at least a part of this cultural heritage a number of authentic objects and buildings have been transferred to the present site of the Museum and conserved in order to be used for further research and to be exibited for the public. The Museum has a particularly elaborate programme to revive old local arts and crafts. Copies of objects of fine workmanship are produced in the workshop of the Museum: pottery, hand printed textiles, utensils of wood and iron. There are also new products inspired by an ancient artistic traditional, but adapted to the needs and tastes of modern man.
A few buildings have been adapted for other activities listed in the Museum programme. Several buildings are intended for visitors: a shop selling the handicrafts of Sirogojno, carpenter's and potter's workshops and a shop for selling medicinal herbs and herbal teas. For summer entertainment, lectures, conserts, literature meetings and other programmes, a special small theatre was built to suit the needs and architecture of the Museum. In case of rain of cold weather programmes take place in a converted barn which is used for different exhibitions as well. One of the old houses located a little further from the Museum site has been transformed into a tavern and a few smaller buildings have been adapted for summer school participants to live in.
Text: Zorica Ivkoviæ |