From the outside, it is questionable whether there really is a museum behind the façade. Malicious tongues might even say that the condition of the Skopje City Museum is synonymous with the city itself. Well, the building has definitely seen better days. But it has also suffered a lot over the years. Since 1970, the former railway station building has housed the city museum; in 1963, it was partially destroyed in a major earthquake. The museum itself was founded in the mid-1940s to collect, protect and research the cultural heritage of the city and its surroundings.
Visiting Skopje City Museum
Upon entering the historic building, a security guard immediately jumped up and led me to the Skopje City Museum. The museum is a room located in the basement, of the adjacent building (?). About a dozen showcases as well as a statue and several artefacts tell a fragmentary history of the Skopje region. If you have visited the Archaeological Museum before, most of the exhibits will look familiar. However, the Archaeological Museum charges an entrance fee, the City Museum does not. So if you want to save money, you can safely visit only the City Museum.
The exhibition also includes some newer exhibits, such as a Stigler lift. These hydraulic lifts were built in Central Europe at the end of the 19th century. What an innovative force he must have had in Skopje… Fortunately, there are also such, almost sentimental pieces, in the exhibition at the Skopje City Museum.
On a large board at the entrance, directly to the right of the stairs, is a retrospective of Skopje’s settlement history. As in the Archaeological Museum, all descriptions are bilingual, in Macedonian and English. For those who have problems here, an offline translation app for the smartphone is recommended.
All in all, I can recommend a visit to the Skopje City Museum.
Skopje City Museum
Address: St. Cyril and Methodius b.b. Skopje, Macedonia
Opening hours: daily 07:00 – 15:00
Website: www.mgs.org.mk
