The collection documents specialized craft trades and service-oriented trades in the context of small-scale production, retail, and private enterprise in the service sector.
The collection consists primarily of items from the equipment of workshops, shops, and other trades active in the first half of the 20th century; in addition to tools, it includes examples of semi-finished and finished products, furniture, work clothing, product packaging, and advertising materials. Specifically, the collection includes tools from the workshops of carpenters, wheelwrights, woodcarvers, inlayers, blacksmiths and farriers, tinsmiths, saddlers, upholsterers, shoemakers, tailors and seamstresses, and clockmakers; to a lesser extent, it documents the trades of bakers, butchers, confectioners, druggists, barbers and hairdressers, printers, carters, so-called convenience store, and clothing stores.
Notable collections include metalwork from the 16th to the 20th centuries and wrought-iron grave crosses from the 19th century. The collection also features individual pieces from other fields and guild artifacts. A unique collection consists of equipment from the Beránek glassworks in Škrdlovice, which operated from 1940 to 2008. Items for the collection have been acquired gradually since the museum’s founding; in the second half of the 20th century, the focus was on acquisitions documenting specific workshops, shops, and establishments as a whole; currently, acquisitions also focus on personal “DIY” projects and traditional craftsmanship.
Regionally, the collection gathers items created or used in Eastern Bohemia (Eastern Polabí, Železné hory, Českomoravská vysočina, Podorlicko). The collection currently consists of over 3000 items.
The collection is managed by Mgr. Matěj Pros.
