The Alsatian Museum in Strasbourg France is located in three adjoining homes built in the 1600’s.
All the homes have inner courtyards with multi-storied covered walkways.
We stayed in the Hotel Corbeau nearby that was similar in style and built in 1528.
The museum homes are filled with over 5000 artifacts depicting everyday life.
Hand carved and painted woodwork is especially charming as you see in this very cozy bed.
Flour mill spouts attest to the emphasis placed on artistry in everyday living.
Many homes of this era contained family businesses like this old pharmacy.
This typical traveling prayer case demonstrates both faithful devotion and an artistic sensibility.
Cheers to you from the old wooden treasures of France~
I love museums that show how “normal” people lived (as opposed to royalty, for example). These houses are gorgeous–especially that lovely curtained bed. I have mixed feelings about those flour mill spouts. While I appreciate them as works of art, those silently screaming faces freak me out a little.
Yes, I hear you on all points. I also prefer cozy, charming abodes to ostentatious, cold castles. The flour spouts are a bit spooky, but not as extreme as medieval water spouts that are truly terrifying.
Wonderful and beautiful. I love the courtyards, the colors, and the crookedness! Fascinating, Cindy. Thanks for the photos!
I love your alliteration, especially the crookedness! They are crooked buildings which adds to their charm.
https://youtu.be/5mAtVsA-pes
J’aime la France! <3
there is a charm in older buildings that we just can’t see or get in the new fangled builds xxo
So true! <3
Great pics, Cindy. Thanks for taking us on your travels!
I am very happy you travel along with me!
Unique et belle! I woodwork in the museum for free. (ლ◖◡◗ ლ)
I love the woodwork, so much of it in Germany and Austria. I love it all! <3
(´▽`ʃƪ)♡
Photos are well taken, Cindy! Thank you so much for touring us to this special and beautiful museum. 🙂
You are an awesome travel companion Amy! <3
💖💓
Beautiful, why oh why don’t we get beauty and attractive courtyards in buildings now. We have grey facias and tiny square windows and no balcony or grass. These have lasted the test of time too. Are those rails for hanging out wet clothes I wonder. Just beautiful Cindy you see the most amazing places.
I hear you loud and clear about modern architecture and I agree with you completely. The thing that so strikes me about medieval Europe is the everyday attention to artistry. The flour spouts are a good example. Our contemporary ones would be beige and made of plastic. I dislike beige, and plastic. Our houses are all beige. And I also love the inner courtyards which is why we have one in our house with a fountain and flowers and the whole bit. I appreciate your resonance Charlotte. <3
Ever so beautiful, Cindy. I simply love those old wooden houses. Btw, your hotel must have been like my most favourite hotel in England, Salford Hall [http://tinyurl.com/yar825bw].
Salford Hall is lovely! The Cotswolds have special place in my <3 because I stayed there for a summer when I was in grad school. Such a completely charming place!
I’ve been to the Cotswolds quite a few times by now, but I’d still love to go back.
So beautiful. And photos are professional. Thanks
Thank you and lovely of you to say!
Oh, the woodwork, just gorgeous. The old balconies, what a statement they make today. The architecture of the past is more impressive than what we do today.
The architecture has warmth, coziness, charm and artistry, and then I fly home to all the big glass box buildings and cookie cutter beige houses……
But I know you do know, I love you more <3
Thank you for this charming taste of France!
Thank you more for appreciating it!
fascinating – love the kitchen and the bed. And the travelling prayer case.
Yes, you have an eye for the details as do I. I appreciate the time that went into making them.
How interesting, Cindy. Just imagining people living in the 1500s floors me! I guess we in the Midwest are “spoiled” by the relative conveniences of life in “modern” times, ha! Not sure I’d feel too comfy in that teeny bed, though (more like claustrophobic!!)
We are bigger then they were back then. Shakespeare’s house is like a hobbit home. You need to be in love with the person you share that bed with! Or else very cold……Laughing~
Wow – I love history so this post was a treasure for me!
Well your comment is a treasure for me.
I love living history especially, like these homes, that make me feel how much more talented these people were than me.
Humans don’t necessarily evolve, which is puzzling.
Another example how well Old World Europe still looks today.
Yes. I love it and I love the feeling of going back in time.
LOVE THIS
So happy you do!
Fascinating – a place I would have loved to go. I do not have a list, but maybe I should make one!
At least a mental list. I keep a list of the places I’ve been so I don’t forget! 😉
Very inspiring and beautiful photos, thanks for the info about each of them as well! Gosh those houses are breathtaking!
Aren’t they wonderful. It is such a treat to stay in them because you feel almost like you have traveled back in time.
Thanks for sharing Cindy, that was one place we missed.
Leslie
You’re welcome. It is impossible to see everything.
You’re right about that.
Leslie
<3
This must have been a fascinating tour where you could envision people’s daily lives. I love how all the buildings have settled and are out of true, much like a funhouse.
Yes crooked houses. I am sure they were plumb 600 years ago! <3
I stayed in a hotel in deep rural France with some splendid wooden bannisters. It also had toilets in the Portakabin in the loft. A psychotic parrot in a cage on the bar. One of my most memorable meals was eaten in the little restaurant watching the old boys playing boules in the square. The pate… I can still recall that. Funny how physical objects can take you back. Not as surely as smell will, though I do recall the smell of the washing drying in the loft. The same loft with the Portakabin.
Yes, well the other undeniable fact about this part of the world is the food. The Alsace region bordering Germany gives you this fusion of German and French cooking traditions that is simply divine. You and I first met over our cooking blogs as you may recall, and I know we both very much appreciate good food which France is justifiably famous for. I would like some of that pate’ right now as a matter of fact……..
Plus, you write really well.
Wonderful! I love the old wooden homes.
They personify warmth and charm.
🙂
You captured a lot of charm, Cindy. It makes me want to go there. My son is living in Versailles until the end of the year, so I’m still thinking maybe 😊.
Oh yes I do hope you go. Pack your warm jacket and go visit the Christmas Markets with him. They are without a doubt the most charming Christmas experience I have ever had.
He is so happy traveling with so many places being a relatively short distance. I’ll have to try to track him down :-).
<3 <3
A gem of a post, dear Cindy! <3 You captured stunningly all those precious surfaces and materials!… We did not make it in our first trip to Strasbourg, to the Alsatian Museum, next time it will be a must!! 😊
You will love it. There is so much more than what I posted! <3
I so enjoy seeing into the past. I love this view.
Yes. Seeing into the past makes me question our current progress.
Oh I’ve been questioning “progress” for years Cindy !!
Good. Keep doing it please!
No problem. (Because I don’t understand it!)
<3
Neither do I….
Cindy these are so beautiful. What a gorgeous place. You have done it justice ! Blows me away. I want to head to Strasbourg now.
Strasbourg has to be one of my most favorite European cities along with Prague. You can spend ages in each city and leave wanting more time!
I have not been to Strasbourg Cindy, I lived in Europe for two years, I visited France a number of times, mostly Paris, the other places I saw were from the window of a bus heading back to Germany.
It is definitely worth adding to your list <3
Putting it I’m the bucket. Dreaming! 🙂
Dreams sometimes come true! <3
they do Cindy! <3
All elegant, Cindy. I particularly like the flour spouts. I assume grain would be ground like at a flour mill and then come shooting out? Or would the flour be kept in a container with a way of letting out measured amounts? Or is it that I don’t have a clue? 🙂 Curt
I don’t know, but I am guessing the grain was ground and kept in huge casks with some sort of lifting door to allow a person’s purchased flour to pour into their receptacle, just like the coffee bean dispensers in whole foods or sprouts. Up goes the door and out pour your beans. You close the door when your bag is spilling beans onto the floor. Laughing…… Hopefully someone might actually know as I am just guessing…….
So beautiful! Wish it were mine. 😉
The hotel we stayed at was built as a hotel in 1528 and has been a hotel all this time. It is amazing to stay in these buildings even as a guest. I wish people who live in these buildings would blog about it with photos!
I do too!
These are lovely, Cindy. 🙂
So pleased you think so & cheers to you dear Ranu <3
So very beautiful.
The whole feeling is understated and enduring like beauty is! Hugs to you dear friend <3
It’s all so old! We have 2 buildings dating back to the late 1600’s. After that … late 1700’s.
Very wonderful that you slept in one!
For quite awhile on the top floor with the roof cats! It was heavenly. Lucky cats <3
Lucky you to be with the cats! 😀
<3 <3
Thank you so much for sharing this. It just speaks to my heart. That is my idea of a vacation,
Thank you for your resonance and hope you visit someday soon! <3
Lovely architecture. I really like the thick wide wooden floor!
Yes. I love them too!
Fabulous! Thanks for taking us with you 🙂
Thank you more for traveling along with me <3
I love Strasbourg – such a beautiful and historic city. Your photos of it are wonderful. 🙂
It is a wonderful place isn’t it. And I haven’t even posted the food photos yet! <e
Amazing that they’ve stood the test of time. I could wander through those rooms and courtyards for a long time, imagining people from the past going about their daily chores. Lucky you to be staying in a similar charming old hotel 🙂
It makes one realize how advanced people were so long ago and how much of this artisan beauty we have lost in our technological world.
Reblogged this on The Writers Desk and commented:
A magical time to be alive.
http://www.animatedimages.org/data/media/466/animated-thank-you-image-0081.gif
Beautiful photos, Cindy. What a wonderful era to have lived in. Thank you for sharing, Paris is a place I didn’t get to visit personally, but thanks for the delightful tour. ☺☺☺
Thank you and I am so happy you traveled with me. You made the experience much richer.
These are indeed treasures!
Yes, precious connections to the past!
🙂
Looks lovely!
Merci beaucoup mon ami~
De rien 🙂
You have really captured the character of the place Cindy! Thanks for taking us along with you 💛
Thank you more for traveling with me & cheers to you Val~
What artists back then and they built houses to last and surrounded themselves with beauty. Now in this area a house is built of ticky tacky and considered old and obsolete at 50 years (or younger) and demolished for a newer, bigger, but definitely not better model. The trend at the moment is square and blocky, no decks or charming verandas, no gardens or grass areas. Thank you for showing us these charming buildings and way of life from so long ago
I think of some sort of entropy, anti-progress. We have lost a slower pace of land based life, with home based businesses, attention to artistry in the smallest details of everyday living, gorgeous cathedrals with music in every town, towns themselves that are works of art, with green spaces and healthy rivers and lakes all around filled with wild life. Progress has brought us glass box buildings, beige cookie box suburban mass development, freeways, crowded ugly cities, plastic and more plastic, harmful chemicals in our food and in our homes, destroyed natural places, and no stunning cathedrals open all the time with regular free organ and choral performers. This is progress.
So sad, but I can’t see any chance of change from a political level. But if we all individually do the best we can maybe we can make our small circles happier with the hope it will spread. Blogs certainly help with connecting people all over the world 💖
Yes! And as Emily Dickinson said, “Hope is a thing with feathers.”
I love the flour mill spouts!
Oh good, so do i!
Tout à fait merveilleux !
Merci beaucoup mon ami!
Wonderful!
Thank you Margaret!
Love the look of this place, Cindy; fabulous!
I am very pleased you enjoyed it & cheers to you!
Ein schöner Bericht. Wir haben in der Schweiz (Switzerland) fast in jedem Dorf ein kleines Museum, das ebenfalls Inneneinrichtungen, Geräte und Artikel aus dem 16. und 17. Jh. zeigt.
Ernst
Ja, ich habe viele dieser kleinen Museen in der schönen Schweiz gesehen. Viele Ihrer Städte sind so, wie die Altstadt von Zermatt, die unglaublich schön war!
Wow! Amazing and fascinating! What a wonderful trip. 😀
These are still photos from the spring trip and it was wonderful visiting these beautiful places~ <3
Beautiful museum….even if I was expecting it to be full of Alsatian dogs! lol… (German Shepherd Dogs) I was most curious lol, I didn’t know such dog museums existed 🙂 Not to worry! It’s always educational as well as delightful to visit your posts!! 🙂
Well here is where you need to go:
http://articles.latimes.com/1992-08-23/travel/tr-6956_1_east-berlin
Now I want to go too!
C’est magnifique!
Merci beaucoup mon ami! <3
The artistry of the flour mill spouts is quite humorous! Their expressions are very reminiscent of people I meet. 😀
Hilarious…….laughing! This is also why we are lucky we don’t walk around with mirrors in front of faces. We might look like this too!
Stunning visuals as usual 🙂
Honored! Thank you & cheers too~
A beautiful and fascinating post, Cindy, Hugs
Hugs back to you & thank you too!
Reblogged this on charles french words reading and writing and commented:
Cindy’s photographs are stunning and beautiful!
I am so lucky to meet people like you in the more real virtual world~
amazing, interesting and beautiful to see read and know about the past. Thank you Cindy <3
Thank you Tanveer for such a beautiful comment & cheers to you!
Reblogged this on Talmidimblogging.
I so appreciate your kind thoughtfulness! Have a wonderful weekend~
You’re very welcome and likewise Cindy 😊
<3
Absolute treasures, Cindy! The bed reminded me of a bed my paternal grandmother used to have. I love sleeping in it on my visits.
When I was a kid I was enraptured by Thumbelina and she slept is a bed in the mole’s house that was just like this. Lucky you! I would love sleeping in it too! <3
Wow! What is there not to like, here?
Well people who go for glitz and gold leaf wouldn’t like it, which is fine by me as I don’t like glitz!
Each to their own. 😉
<3
Beautiful Cindy, thanks for sharing!
Thank you for appreciating~
I’ve never before seen so many stunning details put into objects used for everyday life. Absolutely remarkable.
I think we have lost a lot of that artisan attention to detail and the impulse to create beauty in everyday objects which is sad for us.
I wonder if that has something to do with the disposable nature of everyday objects?
Yes. We mass produce everything so much of which is made of plastic and then we throw it all in the ocean. This is called technological progress.
Yep. Why take the time to make an object intricately beautiful if it’s just going to be thrown into the ocean? And people who don’t live that way are called “primitive.”
Our priorities are going to destroy our species, and lots of others too, I am afraid……
Wow, a hotel from 1528? Great virtual tour Cindy.
So happy you enjoyed it. We stayed in a rampart of a castle on the same trip that was built in the 1200’s!
Oh my. That’s amazing.
I should post photos of the place. It was pretty amazing!
I’d enjoy seeing them, Cindy
<3
We are near Seattle for a conference this weekend. Our hotel is across the street from the Harley Davidson show room and IKEA. I might wander around these as they were museums to the 21st century living. 🏍 -Oscar
Sounds like fun and can’t wait to see your photos!
Wondrous! I experienced these scenes as a mini getaway! Looking forward to the real thing some day! In the meantime, I adore these images and am so grateful for that craftsmanship and woodwork! The challenge of missing other eras and their inspirations… while living in these contemporary times.
Thank you, again.
Thank you for such a thoughtful and lovely comment! I love looking at photos of interior spaces too. It is a vacation for the mind and psyche, so pleased you enjoyed & cheers to you!
Reblogged this on Musings on Life & Experience and commented:
More splendid travel photos from Cindy Knoke.
Hi Cindy! I would have loved loved to see this museum. I think those slice of life museums (like the open air museums) are fascinating. the first photo reminds me of a 17th century place we stayed in Colmar (nearby). Fun fun post Cindy! xo
I remember Colmar well. Such a charming area of the world. Hugs to you Rhonda <3
Agree– we’e been there a couple times and it’s so relaxed and beautiful. xo
<3
Your photos really makes me want to go there!
You will be very happy that you did <3
Lovely, gorgeous and so special!! I am treasuring seeing a wide variety of French and Bayou items in flea markets and other locations in both Louisiana and Mississippi. Hugs from Long Beach and love your positive views on LIFE!
Hugs back to you Robin and enjoy The Big Easy! <3
Breathtaking work…I adore the old kitchen, the imagination just runs away.
Imagination runs away if you are lucky enough to have an active one. This is why bloggers “get” and love each other <3
That’s so true Cindy. I think most of us are spilling over and come here looking for a safe place to share ! 🙂 <3
It is wonderful to find this amazingly talented supportive community of people like you who “get it!” <3 🏵️
Thank you Cindy…it surely is! 👼
🌸 <3
Beautiful place. The top photo reminds me of my childhood home.
That gives me goosebumps! You grew up in a place like this????? <3
Yes, Cindy, the rail was iron and the wall were white, but the setting was the same with so many plants on each level. It was so romantic.
So wonderful! <3
si c’est en france, mais oui j’ai confiance – the original french way of living.
Merveilleux!
merci Cindy! bon dimanche a toi!
<3
What a wonderful place! My ancestor is possibly from Alsace-Lorraine, named Andree, and I’ve always wondered about that place. I love the flour spouts, especially that the women’s had bigger mouths. LOL And that vine, growing up the courtyard. I’ve always wanted a courtyard. 🙂
My daughter’s name is Andrea, but we call her Dre. I love all versions of the name. I have always wanted a courtyard too, and I finally got one at The Holler! I bet you might too <3
Maybe one day. Andree was actually the last name. He was a big tall, German-looking man with a French name who claimed to be from Alsace-Lorraine according to my dad. I love that you call your daughter Dre. Very cool. I have a cousin names Andrea. 🙂
I love your qualifiers, “Big tall German looking, claimed to be from Alsace.”
This reminds me so much of my family’s European history, as related to me by, of course, my family. I was thinking all my life, “Wait, this doesn’t make much sense…….”
Laughing…..
The deal with Alsace is that it has moved back and forth in recent history under German and French control, and it is this wonderful combination of both. You can taste it in the food, and see it in the architecture, art and artifacts. It is a really interesting place in that it is a cultural mix. So it could be entirely true, he was French, and German. All the most interesting places, and people, are such a gimmish, and I suspect you and I might be too.
Maybe it’s a Little America. I like fusion cooking, and people who understand many cultures. It’s fun.
Can you imagine how utterly boring a mono-culture would be! Diversity rocks! <3
Yay! I like your spark!
<3
Very nice.
Alberto Mrteh (El zoco del escriba)
Thanks much & cheers to you!
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