Museum sights in Slovenia
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Municipal Museum
The excellent Municipal Museum is housed in the enormous Gewerkenegg Castle on top of the hill to the west of Mestni trg. The collections, which deal with mercury, lace and local history, are exhibited in three wings centred on a courtyard. The rococo frescoes of plants, scrolls and columns framing the windows and arcades date from the 18th century.
Mercury (Hg) is the only metal that exists in a liquid state at room temperature. The silvery metal is extracted from the mercury ore - a bright-red mineral called cinnabar - by smelting at a high temperature. Mercury is a very heavy metal, much denser than iron, and in the castle's north wing, amid a jungle of minerals and fo…
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Beekeeping Museum
Although it might not sound like a crowd-pleaser, the Beekeeping Museum is one of the most interesting in the country, and there's not a whole lot you won't know about things apiarian after buzzing around for an hour or so inside. The museum is housed (together with a music school) in Thurn Manor, which began life as Ortenburg Castle in the early Middle Ages but was rebuilt with a large hall on the ground floor after the earthquake of 1511.
The cream-and-white structure has interesting reliefs and stucco work on its facade. The museum's exhibits take a close look at the history of beekeeping in Slovenia (which was at its most intense in the 18th and 19th centuries), the c…
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Ljubljana Castle
Known as Ljubljana Castle (Ljubljanski Grad), there have been fortifications of one kind or another on Castle Hill (Grajska Planota) since at least Celtic times, but the existing Ljublijana Castle mostly dates from a 16th-century rebuilding following the 1511 earthquake. It was a royal residence in the 17th and 18th centuries and a prison and barracks in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries.
About 80% of the castle has been renovated in recent years, and it is now frequently used as a venue for concerts and other cultural activities, and as a wedding hall on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.
The castle was a royal residence in the 17th and 18th centuries and a priso…
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Sergej Mašera Maritime Museum
Located in the Gabrielli Palace on the waterfront, the Sergej Mašera Maritime Museum is named in honour of a Slovenian naval commander whose ship was blown up off the Croatian coast in WWI. The mid-19th-century palace, with its lovely moulded ceilings, parquet floors and marble staircase, is worth a visit in itself.
The museum's excellent exhibits focus on sea, sailing and salt-making - three things that have been crucial to Piran's development over the centuries. The salt pans at Sečovlje, southeast of Portorož, get most of the attention on the ground floor. There are some old photographs showing salt workers going about their duties in coolie-like straw hats, as well a…
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Anthony Mine Shaft
The Anthony Mine Shaft, a 'living museum' in the Šelštev building south of Trg Svetega Ahacija, allows you to get a feeling for the working conditions of mercury miners in Idrija.
The tour, lasting about 1¼ hours, begins in the 'call room' of an 18th-century building where miners were selected each morning and assigned their duties by the obergutman (supervisor). There's an excellent 20-minute video in several languages (including English) describing the history of Idrija and the mine.
Before entering the shaft, which was sunk in 1500 and led to the first mine measuring 1.5km long, 600m wide and 400m deep, you must don green overcoats and helmets with the miners' insi…
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Celje Regional Museum
The museum places much emphasis on Celeia and the Counts of Celje, right down to exhibiting 18 of the nobles' skulls in glass cases. (They were taken from the Minorite Church of Mary on Prešernova ulica in 1956, and the one belonging to Ulric is particularly gruesome.) The museum has a dozen rooms, many of them done up in styles from different periods (eg baroque, neoclassical, Biedemeier, Secessionist), painted with various scenes and filled with fine furniture.
Don't miss the 18th-century cabinet with hunting scenes inlaid with ivory, the 20-drawer 'bank' desk with a secret compartment and the neoclassical combined clock and music box that still works. But the museum's…
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Museum of Contemporary History of Slovenia
The Museum of Contemporary History of Slovenia, housed in the 18th-century Cekin Mansion (Grad Cekinov) just northeast of the Tivoli Recreation Centre, traces the history of Slovenia in the 20th century through multimedia and artefacts. Note the contrast between the sober earnestness of the communist-era Room G and the exuberant, logo-mad commercialism of the neighbouring industrial exhibit in Room H.
Its multimedia story begins on the eve of WWI, leading you through a surprisingly effective reconstruction of a typical trench into the quieter days of the postwar Kingdom of Yugoslavia. It gets pretty turbulent in Room E, which deals with WWII and the Italo-German occupatio…
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Maribor Regional Museum
The Maribor Castle also contains the Maribor Regional Museum, one of the richest collections in Slovenia, which is arranged in 20 rooms. Be advised that at the time of research the museum was undergoing extensive renovations and parts (or all) of the permanent collection may be closed.
On the ground floor there are archaeological, clothing and ethnographic exhibits, including 19th-century beehive panels painted with biblical scenes from the Mislinja and Drava Valleys, models of Štajerska-style hayracks, Kurent costumes and wax ex voto offerings from the area around Ptuj. Upstairs there are rooms devoted to Maribor's history and its guilds and crafts (glassware, wrought ir…
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National Gallery
Slovenia's foremost collection of fine art, the National Gallery offers works from the 17th to 19th centuries (check out works by 'national Romantics' Pavel Künl, Marko Pernhart and Anton Karinger), copies of medieval frescoes and a wonderful Gothic statuary (1896). Although the subjects of the earlier paintings are the usual foppish nobles and lemon-lipped clergymen, some of the later works are remarkable.
Take a close look at the works of the impressionists Jurij Šubic (Before the Hunt) and Rihard Jakopič (Birches in Autumn), the pointillist Ivan Grohar (Škofja Loka in the Snow) and Slovenia's most celebrated female painter Ivana Kobilca (Summer). The bronzes by Fra…
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Dormouse Museum & Hunting Collection
In the 19th-century dairy building adjacent to the Snežnik Castle, resides the rather esoteric The dormouse or loir (polh) is a favourite food in Notranjska and the hunting and eating of it is tied up with a lot of tradition, which the museum explores. The fur is used to make the polhovka, the distinctive fur cap worn by Božiček, Slovenia's version of Santa Claus, and dormouse mast (fat) is a much-prized machine oil.
According to popular belief, the dormouse is shepherded by Lucifer himself and thus deserves its fate in the cooking pot.The hunting part of the museum is a nightmare of stuffed animals, antlers and other 'trophies' from the Snežnik-Javornik Massif and Cer…
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Gorenjska Museum
A beautiful plaza, Glavni trg (Main Square) is populated by Gothic and Renaissance buildings; the ones on the western side with their painted facades, vaulted hallways and arched courtyards are masterpieces. The 16th-century one opposite is the former town hall (mestna hiša; Glavni trg 4), which now contains most of the collection of the Gorenjska Museum.
Among the eye-catching bits and bobs lying around is a large porcelain stove topped with a Turk's turbaned head, an embroidered sheepskin coat called a kožuh and a child's toy consisting of a devil sharpening a gossip's tongue on a grindstone. Below the floor of the vaulted vestibule at the entrance to the museum, Slav…
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Museum of Modern Art
Housed in an ugly modern building (Edvard Ravnikar; 1939-51), the inwardly vibrant and inspiring Museum of Modern Art exhibits a permanent collection of 20th-century Slovenian art on two floors that helps put some of the socialist-inspired work of sculptors such as Jakob Savinšek (Protest) into artistic perspective.
Watch out for works by Tone Kralj (Peasant Wedding), the expressionist France Mihelič (The Quintet) and the surrealist Štefan Planinc (Primeval World series). Some people might consider the works by multimedia group Neue Slowenische Kunst (NSK; Suitcase for Spiritual Use: Baptism under Triglav) and the artists' cooperative IRWIN (Kapital) 'fun' rather than …
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National Museum of Slovenia
On the western side of parklike Trg Narodnih Herojev, the National Museum of Slovenia occupies an elegant 1888 building. It has a large collection but at the time of writing only highlights from the rich archaeological and coin collections were on display.
The Roman glass and the jewellery found in 6th-century Slavic graves is pretty standard fare, but the chef d'oeuvre here is the highly embossed Vače situla, a Celtic pail from the late 6th century BC unearthed in a town east of Ljubljana. Make sure you check out the ceiling fresco in the foyer, which features an allegorical Carniola surrounded by important Slovenes from the past and the statues of the Muses and Fates re…
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Alpine Dairy Museum
The Alpine Dairy Museum in Stara Fužina, about 1.5km north of Ribčev Laz, has a small collection related to alpine dairy farming in the Bohinj Valley, once the most important such centre in Slovenia. Until the late 1950s large quantities of cheese were still being made on 28 highland pastures, but a modern dairy in nearby Srednja Vas does it all now.
The four rooms of the museum - a cheese dairy itself once upon a time - contain a mock-up of a mid-19th-century herder's cottage, fascinating old photographs, cheese presses, wooden butter moulds, copper rennet vats, enormous snowshoes and sledges, and wonderful hand-carved crooks.
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Dolenjska Museum
Below The Chapter Church Of St Nicholas About 100m To The Southeast Is The Enormous Dolenjska Museum. The Oldest Building, Which Once Belonged To The Knights Of The Teutonic Order, Houses A Valuable Collection Of Archaeological Finds Unearthed In The Southern Suburb Of Kandija In The Late 1960s.
Don't Miss The Hallstatt Helmet Dating From The 4th Century BC With Two Enormous Axe Blows On Top, The Fine Bronze Situla (Or Pail) From The 3rd Or 4th Century BC Embossed With Battle And Hunting Scenes, And The Celtic Ceramics And Jewellery (Particularly The Bangles Of Turquoise And Dark-Blue Glass).
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Celje Museum of Recent History
Walking eastward along Prešernova ulica from trg Celjskih Knezov, you'll pass the Celje Museum of Recent History in the former town hall building, which was built in 1830. The museum records the story of Celje ('Living in Celje: 1900-2000') from the late 19th century onwards and includes a re-creation of an early 20th-century street complete with tailor, hairdresser, clockmaker and goldsmith.
It also contains the Herman's Den Children's Museum (Otroški Muzej Hermanov Brlog), the first children's museum in Slovenia.
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Jakac House
The Dolenjska Museum Also Administers Jakac House, Which Exhibits Some Of Its 830-Odd Works By The Prolific Painter Božidar Jakac. The Artist Visited Dozens Of Countries In The 1920s And 1930s, Painting And Sketching Such Diverse Subjects As Parisian Dance Halls, Scandinavian Port Towns, African Villages And American City Skylines. But His Best Works Are Of Novo Mesto's Markets, People, Churches And Rumble-Tumble Wooden Riverside Houses.
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Slovenian Ethnographic Museum
The new Slovenian Ethnographic Museum, housed in the 1886 Belgian Barracks on the southern edge of Metelkova, has a permanent collection on the 3rd floor. There's traditional Slovenian trades and handicrafts - everything from beekeeping and blacksmithing to glass-painting and pottery making - and some excellent exhibits directed at children. Temporary exhibits are on the 1st and 2nd floors. Allow extra time for this one; it's excellent.
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Koper Regional Museum
The Belgramoni-Tacco Palace houses the Koper Regional Museum, with displays of old maps and photos of the port and coast, Italianate sculptures and paintings dating from the 16th to 18th centuries, and copies of medieval frescoes. Note the wonderful bronze knocker on the front door of Venus arising from a seashell. The museum's ethnological collection is in a 17th-century building in the eastern section of the Old Town.
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Natural History Museum
Housed in 16 rooms and hallways of the same impressive building as the National Museum, the Natural History Museum contains the usual reassembled mammoth and whale skeletons, stuffed birds, reptiles and mammals. However, the mineral collections amassed by the philanthropic Baron Žiga Zois in the early 19th century and the display on Slovenia's unique salamander Proteus anguinus are worth a visit.
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Ljubljana City Museum
At the eastern end of Trg Francoske Revolucije is the excellent Ljubljana City Museum, which has reopened after a four-year renovation and focuses on Ljubljana's history, culture and politics. The reconstructed Roman street that linked the eastern gates of Emona to the Ljubljanica, and the collection of well-preserved classical artefacts in the basement are worth a visit in themselves.
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Ptuj Regional Museum
The Ptuj Castle houses the Ptuj Regional Museum on its three arcaded floors, but mostly worth the trip for the views of Ptuj and the Drava. The shortest way to the castle from here is to follow narrow Grajska ulica, which starts just west of the Garni Hotel Mitra and leads to a covered wooden stairway and the castle's Renaissance Peruzzi Portal dating from 1570.
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Prešeren Memorial Museum
The restored Prešeren House now contains the Prešeren Memorial Museum in five rooms, two of them with original furnishings. Unfortunately, most of the explanatory notes next to the poet's letters, diaries and manuscripts are in Slovene only. Prešeren is buried in the parish cemetery, now called Prešeren Grove (Prešernov Gaj), about 500m to the north.
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National Liberation Museum
Two blocks north of the castle is a stunning 19th-century mansion housing the National Liberation Museum, whose collections document Slovenia's struggle for freedom throughout the 20th century, with particular emphasis on work of the Pohorje Partisans during the Nazi occupation.
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Lake House Museum
About 2.5km south of Cerknica is the village of Dolenje Jezero, where you will find the Lake House Museum, with a 5m by 3m, 1:2500 scale working model of Lake Cerknica, showing how the underground hydrological system actually works. There's also an ethnological collection.
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