The Stuebing Open-Air Museum

The Austrian Open-Air Museum fills a side valley north of Graz, and the idea behind it is simple: farmhouses, granaries, mills, smithies and chapels that would otherwise have been demolished were taken apart, moved here and rebuilt. There are around a hundred of them, from every province, laid out along the valley in roughly the order the provinces sit on the map, so a walk of a couple of kilometres from one end to the other runs from Burgenland to Vorarlberg. The oldest buildings go back to the sixteenth century. Interiors are furnished, smoke kitchens are sometimes lit, and craftsmen work on demonstration days through the season.

What you actually see

• The smoke kitchens - open hearths with no chimney and roof timbers blackened above them.
• The Vorarlberg farms - shingle-walled timber houses, nothing like the eastern ones a kilometre back.
• The working days - bread baking, forge work and shingle splitting on set dates.
• The valley walk - the whole route through woodland, with the buildings set well apart.

When to go

The museum opens from around the start of April to the beginning of November and closes for the winter. Late spring and early autumn are best: the valley stays cool under trees in high summer, but the buildings are hot inside. Demonstration and festival days are published in advance and are the only times the crafts are actually being worked.

Honest expectations

It is a long walk with a lot of climbing between buildings, and rain turns the valley path to mud. Many houses can only be seen from the doorway. English signage is limited, so without a guide the differences between regional building types are easy to miss. Food is only available at the entrance and there is nothing along the route.

Nearby

Graz is about fifteen kilometres south, with the Mur valley road running past the entrance.