Greisinger Museum

In a hole in the ground...in Switzerland in the Canton of Graubünden, Grisons, there is the only museum in the world which is solemnly dedicated to Middle-earth and J.R.R.Tolkien.

the biggest fun for me was to draw a Hobit-hole...but not from imagination...from nature...

On sunday I was visiting the Greisinger museum in Jenins which is truly mindblowing.
It is set in a real hobbit home, a mansion like Bag-End with a real oaken door, a front hall close to the design of Bilbo's home by John Howe, a room with a fire place and a study room.

Behind that the museum opens to a tour through many rooms of which each resembles a certain location from Tolkien's books like the mines of Moria, Edoras, the forest of Fangorn, Minas Tirith, the river Anduin (including the Argonath) and Mordor. The tour ends in the museum's club house which is (as you might guess) called "the Prancing Pony".

The collection is the most complete and encompassing of Tolkienia world wide including over 600 original paintings and drawings, over 3,500 books and uncountable objects connected to Tolkien and his works.

As an artist I mostly enjoyed to be given the opportunity to see the original works of many of my heroes in art real close. The collection contains artwork by Alan Lee, Ted Nasmith, Chris Achilleos, the brothers Hildebrandt, David Wenzel and Donato Giancola  just to name a few...

Among the books to me most impressive was the print of a handwritten and illustrated copy of the "Red Book of Westmarch" of which there do only exist four copies worldwide. Furthermore there are some very rare copies of first editions of the Hobbit, signed by Tolkien.

The collection contains the sculptures made after John Howe's illustrations, "Smaug the Golden" and "Eowyn and the Nazgul" and also some original props from the Peter Jackson films.

To put it shortly: the place is a blast for every Tolkien enthusiast and fan of fantastic fiction.

Official website

 Trailer on Youtube.

And if you want to know what happened to the Green Man, designed after a drawing of John Howe which decorated the main gate of St. Ursanne... well...visit the Greisinger Museum...