Fatmawati's house, First Lady museum in Penurunan, Bengkulu, Indonesia
Fatmawati's house is a raised wooden building on a white masonry base in Ratu Samban, Bengkulu, with a pinkish-brown upper level, a front veranda with a turned-wood balustrade, and a tiered dark reddish corrugated roof. It follows the Bumbungan Lima traditional house type and covers 92 square metres on a 500-square-metre plot. Inside are original furnishings, including a dressing table, a bed and a 1941 Singer sewing machine.
The house was built in 1915 as the home of Fatmawati's parents. In the 1990s it was fully renovated and turned into the Fatmawati Museum. It stands about 200 metres from the house where Soekarno lived in exile from 1938 to 1942. In 2009 it was designated a city-level cultural heritage site under the name "Rumah Tradisional Melayu/Rumah Fatmawati".
The house displays personal belongings of Fatmawati, including photographs with President Soekarno and a collection of her clothing. These objects offer a direct look into the life of a woman widely regarded as the mother of the nation.
The museum stands on Jalan Fatmawati in the Penurunan kelurahan of Ratu Samban district, about 200 metres from the house where Soekarno lived in exile from 1938 to 1942. The 92-square-metre building sits on a 500-square-metre plot and is entered at ground level; the collection is displayed on the raised wooden floor. It is managed by Yayasan Ibu Fatmawati.
The Singer sewing machine displayed in the living-room corner was made in 1941, and Fatmawati used it to sew the Merah Putih raised on 17 August 1945. The house was her parents' home from 1915 and became a museum in the 1990s; it was registered as a city-level cultural property by decree No. 120 of 4 June 2009.
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