Toy Museum – Benátky nad Jizerou

If you love toys and have visited the Toy Museum in Prague Castle already, it is high time for you to make a trip to Benátky nad Jizerou, a town located less than 50 km northeast of Prague. In the local chateau, on whose ground floor the toy museum is located, you can see historical exhibits from 1860 till 1945. Opened in 1999 the museum presents the largest collection of historical toys in the Czech Republic. Since the opening thousands of tourists from various countries have visited the museum. Despite the fact that the exhibition space was enlarged in 2004, it is still not sufficient and many exhibits are located in the museum depository. Besides Czech toys the museum exhibits also toys from throughout Europe and the United States, and many toys from Japan. A specialty of the toy museum are its several-story doll houses and rooms from the period around 1910 that are furnished to the last detail and that will make each child and adult alike gaze in wonder. Visitors to the museum will see dolls of various types and sizes, trains and an operating railway model, wooden and sheet metal cars, teams of horses, a merry-go-round, a 1,5 meter high spinning Ferris Wheel and much more. The museum is open from April till November and always on state holidays and Easter. You can combine your visit to the museum with touring the chateau, complete with its sgraffito facade, where the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe and Czech composer Bedřich Smetana used to live.

Toy Museum – Chateau, Benátky nad Jizerou, +420 326 316 595, www.muzeumhracek. eu