Back In Time At The Făgăraș Citadel

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Learning about history and tradition is important and what better place to do that, than at historical buildings that have a colorful story to tell. From this point of view, the Făgăraș Citadel is definitely the right place.

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You can see how those defense walls, prison bastions and throne room with your own eyes but not only. At the time of my visit, there was a temporary exhibition and the permanent ones too, which took you back to long gone times.

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Fireplace of the Village, Rebirth of Heritage, this was the title and the theme of the temporary exhibition, hosted in one of the wonderful rooms of the citadel, on the ground floor.

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The first glance in the room already makes you feel like you're stepping into a different era. The floor has been brought up to modern standards (to some extent), but the thick walls and the stones in the walls are true testimony of the past.

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To make it more interesting, instead of just hanging the folk costumes out, the organizers tried to display them in a way to reflect those times and they succeeded in my opinion.

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Men's shirt made in 2023, embroidery made on a handmade canvas. Handmade canvas was one of the special feature of the exhibition.

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Look at this beauty. Those of you who are following my blog know I post a lot about art, paintings, sculptures, textile and fiber art. This is a shirt for ladies, but you can look at it as a real artwork. The canvas has been hand woven and then embroidered. It doesn't say if the embroidery is also handmade, but either way, it's a nice piece.

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There was a piano in the room as well, with a very fancy chair with a tag on it. Was it mipiano@mipiano's name on it? 😁 Nope, unfortunately not, but I suppose she would have been allowed to play a short piece anyway 😉

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Unlike today, back in those days religion played a huge role in people's lives, so those religious paintings are perfect for the exhibition.

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Those wonderful hand painted, wooden chest could never be missing from such an exhibition. Those pieces of furniture were part of everyone's life back then, rich or poor, just in a different way. The rich had their chest wonderfully carved and painted, while the poor had the simple one that they could make for themselves.

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Although the Orthodox religion is not mine, I look at these creations as artworks.

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This was a brilliant idea of the organizers and nicely executed as well. It's a bit controversial, if you take everything literally, but you don't have to, better look at the value. Let me explain as most of you won't understand what I'm talking about here.

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What you see here is a woman weaving and two other women holding the already finished fabrics. What is out of place is the painted glass window. It is very nice and I love it, but that's an item only the well off or the wealthy could afford, but they didn't do weaving because they had money to hire the poor to do it. Regardless, the setup is brilliant.

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Pay attention to the chair, that dates back to 1861, which makes it 163 years old.

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A very simple shirt, with minimalist embroidery, most likely for everyday wear.

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These were just drawings, the sketch of he stained glass door we saw earlier.

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Today we have an easy job as we can buy or order pretty much any clothing we want, but back then, everything was handmade and you wore what you created. If you were good at it, you could have the nicest clothes. Otherwise, you know ...

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All the wood used at the exhibition was old, which gave the whole exhibition a more authentic look. It was an excellent idea.

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These are all traditional Romanian folk costumes by the way.

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This painting was a bit confusing as the Orthodox religion doesn't have saints or kings with multiple heads so three noses, three mouths are a bit too much, but maybe I'm missing something.

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All in all, I see these exhibitions as an effort to keep the tradition going and the nicest thing here was that all the canvas used was handmade. These days you never know where the items are coming from and barely anything is handmade, so I really appreciated the effort.

We have users on Hive, from all over the world. Let's see if folk costumes from your country look similar to these :)

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Back In Time At The Făgăraș Citadel | Ecency