The open-air village museum Astra is set to open this spring in Sibiu Casa Artelor (House of Arts), a center for craft learning, promoting, and selling local craft art items.

The investment, amounting to EUR 2.5 million, is 85% completed, Ora de Sibiu reported. It covered the refurbishment of a heritage building in Sibiu’s Piața Mică to turn it into a venue hosting craft workshops, an arts & crafts gallery with various items on sale, and a café.

Starting this year, children will be able to attend craft workshops at Casa Artelor and learn to sew, work with wood and clay, and paint traditional folk motifs.

“With the House of Arts we wanted to bring traditional Romanian art closer to younger audiences, make it more accessible, and ensure its longevity. We strongly believe that museums and places of culture need to make the effort of getting closer to the public, to children and youth in particular, because they will carry our cultural heritage further,” Ciprian Anghel Ștefan, the manager of Astra Museum, said.

(Photo: Piața Mică by Calin Stan | Dreamstime.com)

simona@romania-insider.com