Ethnographic Museum

This building is the Ethnographic Museum. What you see is a house rebuilt in the 60s, designed as an ideal model of a traditional nineteenth-century home in Gjirokastër, with stone walls on the ground floor, wooden upper levels, small windows and a roof covered with stone slabs. Originally, this site was the birthplace of Enver Hoxha, born here in 1908, the dictator who ruled Albania from 1945 to 1985 and established a highly closed communist regime marked by political repression, international isolation and a radical ban on religion. The original house, however, was destroyed by fire, and the building you see today is neither a faithful reconstruction of that home nor a place devoted to his memory. Since 1991, all references to the dictator have been deliberately removed, and the museum now presents a purely ethnographic narrative. Inside, the visit offers an immersion into the daily life of wealthy families in nineteenth-century Gjirokastër. You discover the oda, the large reception room reserved for guests, richly decorated with carpets, cushions and carved wood, the winter room organised around the fireplace, the traditional kitchen with its copper utensils, and spaces dedicated to wool processing and everyday domestic activities. It’s important to keep in mind that this museum presents a simplified and educational reconstruction. It provides a clear introduction to local architecture and traditional ways of life, but it is not a house preserved with all its original elements, unlike nearby private residences such as the Skënduli House.