Kyiv: a walk through the Pyrohiv open-air museum

A village museum inside the city. A walk of about 3 km through the National Museum of Folk Architecture and Folkways of Ukraine in Pyrohiv (Pirogovo), on the southern edge of Kyiv. In its large park-like area (about 130 hectares, with more than 300 wooden buildings brought from all regions of the country) you walk from the villages of Central Ukraine and Polissia to the Carpathians, Podillia and the Poltava region, with windmills, churches, farmsteads and craftsmen’s workshops.

What you see. Thatched and shingled houses with their original furniture and embroidered towels, wooden churches, wells with a sweep, windmills on the hills and, in season, craft markets with potters and weavers. At the weekends there are festivals with music and folk costumes.

Good to know. The museum is open daily and is big – allow two to three hours for this loop and more if you enter the buildings. The paths are unpaved and can be muddy after rain. The music is Ukrainian folk music.

Picture: A windmill in the Pyrohiv museum, Haidamac, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.