Riga and The House of the Blackheads

We didn't have much time to plan our trip to Latvia until the very last moment. We were both so consumed by work at that time that we didn't even realize that our trip was coming in a few days.

I told my colleagues where we were going, and I was lucky that one of them spent a few days in Riga many years ago, and he remembered exactly which places he visited and which places where worth to visit. One of the things that he said was: Make sure that you will visit The House of the Blackheads!

Honestly, I was a bit uncomfortable with its name, but we wanted to visit it anyway to see what it was all about. And this is where I will take you today, but first let's walk to get there! 🙂

It was a beautiful sunny day and we enjoyed walking around the city.

I was surprised to see so many churches in Riga. Here we have two Lutheran churches in very close proximity. On the right we have St. Peter's Church and on the left St. John's Church. They were both constructed in the 13th century, so you might wonder why they built two Lutheran churches so close to each other. St. John church was under responsibility of Dominican friars at that time and it only changed to Lutheran several centuries later.

We were standing in front of The Latvian National Museum of Art for a couple of minutes deciding if we should enter or not. The building is massive and we were sure that it would take us all day to go through the exhibitions, and as we didn't want to waste the day inside we said that we will do it when we visit Riga again.

Next to the museum is The Art Academy of Latvia. I cannot imagine a better place for art studies than next to The National Museum of Art. This building reminded me of Amsterdam or Utrecht.

There are many important buildings on this street, one of them is The Latvian National Theatre. At first, I thought it would be impossible to take a photo without any cars as this is probably the busiest street of Riga, but I was lucky in the end. It only took me about 20 shots 🙂

Just a few meters away from the theatre is the Riga castle. When you follow my posts you must know that I was excited to visit the castle. Unfortunately, this is the presidential castle and it's in use, therefore closed to public.

The castle is rather small (in my opinion) and the only part of it that resembles a castle as I know it is this tower. There is another tower on the other side of the castle, but we didn't know about it at that time.

I have such fond memories of The Freedom Monument. It's the place where we came across many street artists and also orchestral artists who performed a concert to support Ukraine. It was an amazing performance, and there were hundreds of people listening to them. The music was beautiful and made me emotional to the point that I couldn't hold back tears. It was a powerful experience, and I still get goosebumps only thinking about it.

Here are those talented orchestral artists. My husband says that he will never understand my ability to get in front of any crowd so easily and with grace. I guess it's because of my size. I fit everywhere 🙂

The Freedom Monument was constructed in 1935 using donations from residents as a memorial to those who died fighting for the independence of Latvia. The female statue on top of memorial is holding three golden stars which symbolize three historic provinces of Latvia. Freedom Monument

It's a great meeting point as there are several signs in the city showing you the direction to the memorial.

Another important landmark in Riga is The Three Brothers. These are the oldest medieval houses in the city. The oldest brother (on the right) dates back to the 15th century and the youngest brother (on the left) to the 18th century. Today, the houses host The Latvian Museum of Architecture and The State Inspectorate for Heritage Protection.

I must say that we struggled to find them. We passed by them a couple of times without realizing that these were The Three Brothers. The buildings are bit worn down and I was expecting deeper colors on the facade.

Just a few more streets and we will be arriving at The House of the Blackheads...

Here we are!

The square in front of The House of the Black Heads was one of the busiest parts of Riga. I'm not surprised as it's one of the most interesting structures in the city.

It was built in 1334 as a venue for various events and it was destroyed during World War II. We saw some photos from that time in the museum, and there really was not much left of its original outlook. The reconstruction was done in 1999. The building serves as a museum and you can also rent its impressive rooms for your events.

The entrance fee to the museum is 8 EUR, and it's a great price for what you will experience.

One look in the opposite direction of the square before we enter the museum 🙂

We have received audio guide with our tickets which was great as we learned a lot not only about history of The House of the Blackheads but about Latvia as well.

We have started our tour in the medieval cellar. We were welcomed by the full armor and pictures of arms of certain knights of the round table.

Cellars showed us practical activities of medieval times, such as the way in which the goods were weighted and measured.

There was no wine in these, we tried 🙂

The Black Heads were travelling merchants protecting their goods during long journeys. Here we can see the symbols of these journeys: Goods, an armor and a boat.

Who were the Black Heads?

The brotherhood of Black Heads was registered in the 15th century. They were young, unmarried merchants who chose St. Maurice as their patron. He was portrayed as a black soldier, an Egyptian martyr, and therefore they started calling themselves the Black Heads.

The House of the Blackheads served as a club. The members came here every day to hold meetings or just to relax. There were rooms with games, such as chess and there were also some physical games.

There is a room in a cellar with a big screen on which you can watch a short movie about their history and as well as history of Riga. I think it lasted less than 20 minutes and it was interesting.

This sculpture shows St. Maurice himself. It was a gift to Riga city. The sculpture is made of silver and it's decorated with diamonds and other precious stones.

From the medieval cellar we entered the representative rooms called Historical cabinets. These rooms served as office of the President of the Republic of Latvia.

Today, there is a display of historical furniture, crystal and silver items. The silver exposition is extensive as there was a lot of silver items collected since the 15th century when a tradition of new members paying a sum of silver to join the club was introduced. The collection is however no longer complete as many objects were lost during the war as well as moved to Bremen by the Black Heads themselves.

Let's go to next part of the representative part of the museum.

This room is called The Lubeck Hall. Its name comes from the German city which had a great connection with the Black Heads. The room is decorated with stunning chandeliers as well as stained glass windows. It is designed to host official banquets, and there are still formal state dinners organized here.

And now we are in my favorite room called The Celebration Hall. We spent most time in this hall.

It is a huge space decorated with many royal paintings, impressive chandeliers, heavy curtains and stained glass windows as well. There was some classical music in the background and we were alone all the time! No, we didn't dance 🙂 but we took tons of pictures. You can rent this room for your event as well.

The painting on the ceiling is called Apotheosis of Saint Maurice.

We were impressed by the collections and also by the representative rooms as we didn't really know what to expect when we entered the museum. If we would come back to Riga we would visit The House of the Blackheads again.

This is just to give you an idea of how big is The Latvian National Museum of Art, and to show you that I take better pictures than my husband 🙂

I hope you have enjoyed our trip.

Thank you for reading!

Cheers,
Martina