The most visible and most financially demanding part of the project is the construction of a new, modern and interactive glass exhibition. The visitor facilities will also be renovated. For this reason, the museum will be closed in 2023.

“Connected by Glass!” was a project carried out by the town of Železný Brod in cooperation with the Municipal Museum in Železný Brod.
Funded by the EEA and Norway Grants, the project aimed to strengthen the management of cultural heritage through the revitalisation of the museum premises, ensuring the optimal conservation of its collections.
It also sought to introduce an innovative approach to the presentation of the collections and to support further initiatives leading to deeper bilateral cooperation and regional development.
The total funding provided by the EEA and Norway Grants amounted to 28,166,983 CZK.. https://www.eeagrants.cz/

 The project was launched on April 1, 2021, and concluded on April 30, 2024.

WHAT WAS THE PROJECT ABOUT?

New exhibitions and digitalisation

Its most visible aspect was the construction of a new, modern, and interactive exhibition, along with the renovation of visitor facilities. The modernisation of the museum was also accompanied by a significant process of digitisation. A large portion of the collection was digitised and made accessible online. The new exhibition was also digitised and made available on the museum’s website as a virtual tour. The project further included the professional documentation of the historical glass collection.

International Summer Glass Workshop Symposium

The Summer Glass Workshop, organised in cooperation with the museum, the Secondary School of Applied Arts, the Town of Železný Brod, and the Detesk company, was a prestigious event for glass artists. Each year, four artists were selected to participate in the symposium. With support from the project, two Norwegian glass artists took part in the symposium in 2021, 2022, and 2023. This international participation enhanced the prestige of the symposium and helped foster strong ties with the Norwegian glassmaking community. International collaboration raised the profile of the artistic glassmaking tradition in Železný Brod.

Romani people and glass

One of the museum’s key objectives was to research and reflect the phenomenon of glassmaking in Železný Brod. This included detailed scholarly research. Accordingly, the museum decided to map the contributions and role of the local Roma community in regional glass production. Research was conducted on the topic of Roma and glass, the findings of which were included in the new permanent exhibition. In cooperation with the Museum of Romani Culture, the museum also held an exhibition of works by Rudolf Dzurko, an artist who worked with coloured glass. To involve the local Roma community in this legacy, the museum organised three glass-themed workshops for Roma children as part of the project.

Research output: Železnobrod Romani people and glass 

What is behind the magic of the project?

Cooperation!

The Postcards sub-collection (signature Ph, approx. 400 items as of 12/2022) contains lettercards, postcards and photo postcards thematically related to the Železný Brod region. A great deal of them are the work of local publishers, printers and publishers (Baumgartner, Kotrba, Piroch, Vačlenová, Hilger and others). The oldest lettercards in the sub-collection date from 1900.

The photographic sub-collection (signature F, approx. 500 items as of 12/2022) contains photographs and negatives that relate to Železný Brod and its immediate surroundings in terms of subject matter and provenance. The sub-collection contains works of amateur and professional photographers. It also includes the output of the first photography studios in Železný Brod (Maischeider, Zeman and Hilger). The photographs depict the town and its surroundings, events, people and more. The oldest reliably dated photograph is a double portrait from the studio of František Maischeider dated 1879.

The textile sub-collection (signature T, 485 items as of 12/2022) contains components of folk costume (caps, ribbons, skirts, etc), clothing accessories (shawls, aprons, shoes, stockings, gloves, ribbons, hats, caps, etc) and common household textiles (tablecloths, bedspreads, embroidery, embroidery patterns, aprons and curtains). The sub-collection also includes uniforms or their components (Sokol costume, legionnaire’s uniform, helmets, etc). The collection ranges from the mid-19th century to the latter half of the 20th century.