Palanok in 1:200

If you’ve never seen Michael’s church in Uzhok or Holy Spirit Church in Guklive, Vasilkovsky, Bronkovsky or Kvasovsky castles, if you have never been to Palanok Castle in Mukachevo or Kankiv Castle inVynohradiv, then you may feel the medieval spirit and even touch architectural masterpieces in your hands in Uzhgorod.

It is here that students of the club "Master hobby" of Transcarpathian regional palace of children and youth art "Padiun” learn to cut, glue, solder and paint not only majestic castles and ancient shrines, but also ships, trains, knights as well as recreate life of those times . All this one can see in miniature.

First there were tanks

Club "Master Hobby" has existed for several years in "Padiun". First, says Deputy Director of Education and Methodology Nadezhda Ganko, children made tanks. Later they got interested in architectural structures – Transcarpathian medieval castles and churches. "Now, in a comprehensive regional historical and research studies program of the Palace "Save the treasures of native land", under the guidance of our teacher Kalman Vishkolts, they are making ​​amazing miniatures. Thanks to the project "Past with the hands of future", there are now reconstruction maquettes of almost all Transcarpathian castles – Serednyanskiy, Kvasovskiy, Mukachevo, Uzhgorod, Chinadievskiy, Bronkovskiy and others. There are also Boiky, Hutsul and Lemky churches. These studies mainly motivate children to learn history from inside, students feel themselves to be a part of it, because they personally touch it, its architecture, culture, they show interest, their attitude changes completely – they start appreciating and cherishing the treasures of their homeland".

Children reproduce the history of the region out of cardboard, veneer, clay, sand, corn leaves, stones and thread. Transcarpathians’ everyday scenes are the result of collaboration between different sections. They even make dolls out of threads, for without them the construction is not alive. The children are making three-dimensional pictures and have recently started making knights.

The works of “Padiun” students are known not only throughout Transcarpathians, but also abroad. Last year the students participated in the exhibition "Czech Republic – the country of fairy-tale castles and fortifications", organized by the Consulate General of the Czech Republic in Lviv in cooperation with the charity organization "E. Egan Foundation". There is the children’s handiwork in Hungarian Niredgaza – a small copy of the Prussian train T-3 of 1882, which used to run around Transcarpathian region in the XIX-XX centuries. Their masterpieces have been recently exhibited at the festival in the village of Dubky in Uzhgorod region.