Museo del Costume e delle Tradizioni

On the ground floor of the San Francesco cloister, Guardiagrele's Museum of Costume and Traditions presents recreated domestic spaces and tools of local trades, assembled since the 1980s to document peasant and artisan life.

Why it matters

Created in the 1980s, the museum occupies rooms on the ground floor of the San Francesco cloister. Its domestic displays include looms, spinning wheels, hearth equipment and kneading troughs, alongside tools associated with farming and crafts. The collection documents household and artisan life in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including trades that have since disappeared.

What to notice

The displays include recreated cooking and baking spaces, looms, spinning wheels and warping frames, as well as clothing and textiles. Other sections present tools and equipment associated with cabinetmakers, joiners, dyers, cobblers, ceramicists, coppersmiths and wrought-iron workers. The cloister of San Francesco forms part of the religious complex whose church and antiquarium preserve other elements of the town's history.

Context and history

The museum took shape in the 1980s. Its documentation draws on published work by Elsa Flacco and Lucio Taraborrelli on Guardiagrele's history and traditions. It is part of the town's group of museums and heritage sites around the San Francesco complex.