A craft trip to Slovakia

I’m just back from a fantastic week in Slovakia as part of a traditional craft skills project organised by Grampus Heritage. We were based at Lišov Museum where Jakub and Adriana are working to preserve the local cave houses and crafts of the area.
During the week, our main tasks were based around repairing and renovating the cave houses which are dug out of the local cliffs as homes and also wine cellars. They were still in use during the 20th century but many are now suffering from neglect or inappropriate work on them over the years.

Our lunches for the week was cooked by Danka, a local woman, using food from her smallholding. Her hospitality was fantastic and was a highlight of the trip. Also during our stay, I took time to visit one of the local cemetaries where candles had been lit for All Saint’s Day.

There was also loads of traditional crafts around and, of course, I took my own tools along with me so I could do some carving there. I’ll write more about those and post the rest of my photos in future posts.