Exhibition Hall of Carpets & Woodcarving

The Exhibition Hall of Carpets & Woodcarving, 500m northwest of the bus station, exhibits and sells examples of the famed Kotel style of carpets. The town also has several museums, the best being the History Museum, on the central square, which presents items dating from 19th-century revolutionary times, and Georgi Rakovski’s mammoth mausoleum. The Ethnographic Museum, about 200m west of the Exhibition Hall, is also worth a peek. For a more visceral connection with Bulgarian tradition, you can learn to play the gayda (Balkan bagpipe) and get tuition in other traditional music and dance at the Philip Kotev School, which sometimes holds recitals.