Karolis Banys and Petras Gaidamavičius bought an old, interwar apartment in the very heart of Lithuania’s Kaunas and established the Art Deco Museum there. Today, everything there looks exactly like in 1929.
All furniture and interior details in the apartment are original, meaning that they are around a hundred years old.
“The first room where guests come, both in the old days and now, is the dining room. We have a very valuable buffet there. That’s really where our time travel started,” Karolis says.
“This buffet was in a small two-room apartment. It had belonged to a family in Kaunas for generations, but it just took up too much space for them, so they decided to give it up. We brought it back to life,” he adds.
According to the founders of the museum, interwar Lithuania was very progressive because both the layout of the apartment and other building solutions were well thought out.
“In this apartment, the authentic layout has remained unchanged. Fifteen authentic doors were also kept. They are in perfect working condition. We have even kept the authentic door hinges, which did not need to be replaced because they are made of quality materials,” Karolis explains.
Another discovery in the old Art Deco apartment is the flooring. “We emphasise that this is the old oak parquet from 1929, laid in a herringbone pattern, which was very typical of the period. We didn’t redo it, we just gently scrubbed the parquet,” the men say.
After furnishing another modern flat, Karolis and Petras also realised that renovating an old apartment and furniture is a less costly and more sustainable solution.
“The kitchen in the Art Deco museum cost 4,000 euros, while in the new-built apartment, it cost around 8,000 euros. In this case, restoring or reusing furniture is twice as cheap as buying them new,” they say.
“There are a lot of old buildings that have been preserved and can be brought back to life. Restoration is certainly one way of saving the planet,” the men add.
According to them, the Art Deco museum educates visitors not only on the life and design of interwar Lithuania but also on the possibility to live more sustainably by restoring and reusing old items.
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