Chiltern Open Air Museum

About this place

Chiltern Open Air Museum was founded by volunteers in 1976 and opened to the public in 1981, on a rural site near Chalfont St Giles in Buckinghamshire.

It is a collection of vernacular buildings, rescued from demolition elsewhere and rebuilt across 45 acres of the Chiltern Hills.

The 38 structures on show range from a reconstructed Iron Age roundhouse to a 1940s prefab bungalow.

The museum is a registered charity and sits just minutes from junction 17 of the M25, making it an easy day trip from London.

History

The museum grew out of a volunteer campaign to save threatened historic buildings from demolition, formally established in 1976 and welcoming visitors from 1981. Rather than preserving buildings on their original sites, its founders chose to dismantle and reconstruct them in one landscape, a method known as structure relocation. It remains a charity in English law, run today with a small paid staff supported by around 200 volunteers.

Architecture

The collection is entirely vernacular architecture, the ordinary houses, farm buildings and workplaces of people rather than grand estates. Individual buildings include a wood-framed, iron-clad Victorian chapel moved from Henton in Oxfordshire and a post-war prefabricated bungalow of the type mass-produced to ease Britain's housing shortage after 1945.

Gardens & grounds

The 45-acre site includes a working historic farm with sheep, goats and chickens, alongside traditional gardens, woodland and a wartime-style 'Dig for Victory' allotment.

Facilities