Chiltern Open Air Museum

Chiltern Open Air Museum is a museum of vernacular buildings and a tourist attraction located near Chalfont St Peter and Chalfont St. Giles in the Chiltern Hills, Buckinghamshire, England.

The museum was founded in 1976 and aims to rescue and restore common English buildings from the Chilterns, which might otherwise have been destroyed or demolished. The buildings have been relocated to the museum's 45-acre (180,000 m²) site, which includes woodland and parkland.

The collection has more than 30 buildings on view including barns, other traditional farm buildings and houses.

Prefabricated post-war home at Chiltern Open Air Museum - Universal House, Mark 3, steel frame clad with corrugated asbestos cement

Buildings of interest include a 1940s' prefab from Amersham, a reconstruction of an Iron Age house, a Victorian toll house from High Wycombe, a "Tin Chapel" from Henton and a forge from Garston. A fine pair of cottages from 57 Compton Avenue at Leagrave, near Luton which started out as a weather-boarded thatched barn with central double doors in the early 18th century. In the late 18th century the barn was converted into two labourers' cottages.

The museum's collection includes 16 buildings that are in storage and due for re-erection as and when the museum's funds permit.

Chiltern Open Air Museum is a registered charity (No. 272381). Chiltern Open Air Museum has a small number of full time staff and a volunteer workforce of approximately 200.

References

• "Chiltern Open Air Museum", Bucks Free Press, 25 August 2004

External links

• Museum website

Coordinates: 51°38′10.87″N 0°32′29.05″W / 51.6363528°N 0.5414028°W / 51.6363528; -0.5414028