In the warehouse of the Educational Park “Branice”, which is temporarily located at Igołomska Street, there are currently 56 inventoried exhibits. Another twelve are waiting to be transferred. Organizer of the open-air museum Kraków Nowa Huta of the Future SA came into possession of the items on the basis of donation agreements concluded with the current owners. The still incoming reports are verified by Krakow Nowa Huta of the Future SA employees on an ongoing basis. Items have their registration cards and entries in the books (of receipts, inventory, inventory). They are divided into 3 categories: artistic-historical, ethnographic and agricultural, the latter now constituting the majority of the exhibits.
The items come from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The agricultural exhibits are dated even in the second half of the 20th century. Of the twentieth century. They cover the area of functioning of the ethnographic group of Krakowiacy Zachodni.
Among the items collected so far, the following can be distinguished:
– the knocker – a musical instrument used during the ritual frenzy of Holy Week. Additionally, thanks to the sounds made when shaking, the instrument was used to scare the game and to play with children;
– a wooden grain shovel with a deep pan, commonly used for farm work;
– a ladder wagon – “a wasąg” with a space between the rungs of a woven basket, used by one of the farmers in Zesławice;
– bourgeois cupboard, made of oak wood. A two-storey chest furniture, intended for storing dishes. On its lower part there is a setting – glazed on the sides with an elliptical mirror in the centre;
– numerous horse-drawn tows for attaching agricultural machinery;
– a cheese breed that was widely used in the last century for pressing curd. It is used on some farms until today
– the gate from the barn, which no longer exists, from the beginning of the 20th century, with a carved rosette;
– wooden hives and a barrel for sauerkraut;
– a plaster sacred figure, polychrome with Our Lady of the Rosary standing on a plinth covered with linen and roses. Probably the workshop of a craftsman from Częstochowa – Stanisław Kazikowski;
– leather bras, including one with a plate identifying the owner and address;
– rolling mill – a tool for sharpening knives, with a stone based on a wooden structure;
– a wooden chipper for preliminary cleaning of threshed grain, separating coarse impurities (ears, returns) and light impurities (chaff);
– small hand tools used in farms near Krakow in the 19th and 20th centuries.
These items are subjected to conservation and renovation measures. They are patiently waiting to be presented to the first visitors to the Branice Educational Park.
This collection is just being created, parallel to the activities related to the investment in the infrastructure of the open-air museum and preparations for the relocation and reconstruction of the first historic cottages and farm buildings.
A very rich collection of antique tools and objects can also be found in the Nowa Huta Cultural Centre. There, in the so-called “U Szpinaka” cottage, among the huge number of household tools, tapestries, culinary collections, the history of Nowa Huta and folklore, workshops were organized (currently suspended), conducted using the play method.
Finally, an appeal – if you have everyday objects (including literature, products of folk art, furniture, etc.), agricultural tools or other equipment and items that may constitute an exhibition of the open-air museum and you would like to provide them – please contact the employees of Krakow Nowa Huta of the Future SA (biuro@knhp.com.pl).