Stadtmuseum Aš, Museum in Aš, Czech Republic

Stadtmuseum Aš occupies a historic building in the town center that blends characteristics of a castle and a manor house. The museum holds collections that document the region's past and how people lived there.

The museum was founded in 1892 and struggled for a permanent home; its collections were kept in two grammar-school rooms in the early 1920s, then moved to the former town hall in 1958. Since 1966 it has occupied the so-called zámeček on Mikulášský vrch, built by factory owner Klaubert on the site of the former von Zedtwitz castle next to St Nicholas Church.

The museum's textile exhibition, opened in 1986, traces spinning, weaving, knitting and dyeing in the region up to the mid-20th century, and the looms and knitting machines on show still run. A collection of 22,000 pairs of gloves documents Aš's glove-making trade, alongside clothing fashions from the late 19th to early 20th century.

The museum has two sites: the Textile Museum in the so-called zámeček on Mikulášský vrch, its home since 1966, and the Muzeum Ašska in the former fire station, used since 2014. The grounds hold a lapidarium of tombstones from the former Protestant cemetery, and traces of old defensive walls run through the park and footpaths on the castle hill.

The collection includes textiles and objects of industrial heritage that document Aš as a manufacturing center. These pieces tell the story of craft traditions and the economic shifts the town went through.