Cultural heritage - The Šenoa House opens its doors

After lengthy preparations, the Šenoa House is now open to ghe general public. It showcases the rich legacy of the family of Croatian novelist August Šenoa, spanning the lives of four generations and epitomising the story of Zagreb.

The Šenoa House was opened on the street of Ivo Mallin 27 in mid-October, and features a very valuable legacy of the family of the great Croatian novelist August Šenoa (1838 – 1881) who have occupied this house for 182 years.

The Šenoa House tells the story of the four generations of the upper class family and gives an insight into the history of Zagreb.  The family’s legacy has been declared  a protected cultural asset. The novelist’s grandson, Zdenko – the last of his successors, began the task of listing the valuable heritage of the Šenoa family. Together with his second wife, he spent years gathering documentation  with the goal of opening the Šenoa House. The goal, however, was achieved only by their successors, and the Šenoa House is curated by the family of Jasmina Reis - Zdenko’s wife’s daughter from her first marriage.

Although August Šenoa himself never lived in the house on Mallin Street, which was built by his older son Milan in 1929, more than two and a half thousand items are displayed there and include the personal possessions of the author of the first Croatian novel – “Goldsmith’s Gold”, which is still part of compulsory reading in schools. There is his table with an ink jar and pen, which he used to write thousands of pages of his five novels and numerous short stories, as well as various other items from his everyday life.

The museum of August Šenoa and his family spreads across two floors and reconstructs the story of the rich life that ensued inside the house – the home of his children and their mother Slava. Having become a very young widow, she outlived her husband August Šenoa by 64 years and continued to live with her children.

The Šenoa House is open to the public Mondays to Fridays, from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m., while on Saturdays it is open between 11 a.m. and 6 p.m., with organised guidance every other hour.