Last weekend we decided to head out to the Latvian Ethnographic Open-air museum, here in Riga for the contemporary crafts fair. We haven’t been there in a year and the memories that I have from that place are wonderful.
The museum is located in the woods, only thirty minutes from home, and it showcases traditional Latvian houses. Every single little house is furnished just the way it would have been a century ago: handcrafted furniture, traditional ornaments, beautiful textiles, wooden tools, weaving looms, spinning wheels, and yarn!
When i was inside, I was literally running fanatically from one spot of the room to another, trying to capture every single detail with my camera.
If they would have asked me to settle there, I would have say "yes", without a doubt! But I'm sure it must be quite cold during the Winter though.You can find a tiny or a luxurious vegetable garden behind every wooden house. Big zucchinis and peas were growing up there, and I forced myself not to sneakily put some as souvenir in my bag! Instead, we bought a copious amount of bread that they bake here at the museum. They only use tradtionnal methods of baking and cooking, including the technique of putting fresh leaves under the bread for baking. As soon as I had the bread in hands, I totally forgot to snap some pictures, I was t busy trying not to eat the whole loaf.
I'm sure to be there again this year. At the beginning of September, there's the Old craft fair (that screams yarn to me), then there's the Autumn harvesting festival and the bread festival...
It's truly a wondeful place to visit. And if you ever plan to come to Riga, we might meet there!