From the cute to the horrific: Switzerland’s weirdest museums

Cosy: the bar at the HR Giger Museum. HR Giger Museum

Switzerland has some of the biggest and best museums in the world, but it is also home to some really bizarre and niche ones. Which museum, for example, has “enough material for a thousand nightmares”? (Clue: it’s got nothing to do with HR Giger.)

Switzerland has the highest density of museums in the world, with more than 1,000 devoted to a wide range of topics. To mark International Museum Day on Saturday, here’s a look at some that are off the beaten tourist track.

Frog Museum

Keystone

Nothing to see here. Just a frog riding a squirrel. And frog pupils in a classroom. And, well, more than 100 frogs, dating from the 19^th century, in “typical scenes from everyday life”, according to the Frog MuseumExternal link in canton Fribourg, which is actually part of the Museum of Estavayer-le-Lac. “It is the rarity, quality and conservation of this work that make it so precious.” Plus the utter weirdness.

Sewing Machine Museum

Keystone

Have you got a mind like a sewer? If so, you’ll love the Swiss Sewing Machine MuseumExternal link in Fribourg, which has more than 250 displayed in a 12th-century vaulted cellar. The collection is part of the Wassmer Museum, which also has a unique collection of historical household appliances: mechanical vacuum cleaners and irons from different eras, and everything to do with the art of washing since the 19th century.

Teddy Bear Museum

© 2024 SWMB, Foto: Cornelia Vinzens

If you’ve got a phobia of teddy bears – apparently that’s a thing – you might want to stay well clear of the Spielzeug Welten Museum BaselExternal link (Toy Worlds Museum Basel) which has 2,500 of them, the largest collection in the worldExternal link. Discover where they (probably) got their name from and why the 120-year-old specimen known as PGB 35 is “a milestone in teddy bear history”. The museum also has countless historical dolls, merry-go-rounds, toy grocer’s and more. Children – of all ages – will love it.

HR Giger Museum

Museum HR Giger

Children probably won’t love the HR Giger MuseumExternal link in Gruyères, canton Fribourg – indeed, anyone 16 or under must be accompanied by an adult. And frankly many adults should probably be accompanied by an adult. Giger, who died ten years ago, was a Swiss artist and sculptor best known for creating the monster in the film Alien – and that was one of his tamer efforts. The museum, which Giger designed and curated himself, is stuffed with his “biomechanical” artwork, where flesh meets machine, and goes heavy on sex and violence. Not everyone’s cup of tea, but if you want/need a drink, the adjacent bar is great: part film set, part alien cathedral.

Beer Bottle Museum

Damian Imhof

If you have an interest in beer – or bottles – you won’t want to miss the Beer Bottle MuseumExternal link in St Gallen. The collection of 3,000 beer bottles from 260 Swiss breweries shows how Switzerland, and eastern Switzerland in particular, was and still is a bona fide bastion of beer brewing. Not to be confused with the Swiss Beer MuseumExternal link in the former Cardinal brewery in Fribourg.

Museum of Witchcraft

©Severin Bigler/Aargauer Zeitung and ©Hexenmuseum Schweiz

“No one tortured witches like the Swiss,” we wrote a few years ago. Switzerland’s Anna Göldi is considered the last witch to be executed in Europe – in 1782. Göldi, who was officially exonerated in 2008, has her own museumExternal link in Glarus, which focuses on her trial and fate and specifically on human rights. The Hexenmuseum SchweizExternal link (Swiss Museum of Witchcraft) in Gränichen, canton Aargau, offers an overview of the witch trials in Switzerland and Europe plus folk religion, remedies to protect and to heal, witch animals, medicinal and magical herbs, supernatural characters and ghosts. You’ve got to be 11 to get in.

If that’s not enough, you might also like the HenkermuseumExternal link (Hangman’s Museum) in Sissach, canton Basel Country. The former jailhouse is crammed with instruments of execution and torture, including guillotine blades and beheading swords.

Jaquet-Droz automata

An absolutely extraordinary experience is watching the three 250-year-old Jaquet-Droz automataExternal link in action at Neuchâtel’s Museum of Art and History. Built by watchmakers, the Musician really plays an organ and the Draughtsman really draws pictures. But it’s the Writer who, for my money, is the star. The 70cm dapper young man can be programmed to write any text up to 40 characters long and does so by dipping his quill in ink (including a shake of the wrist to prevent it from spilling!). What’s more, his eyes follow the text as he writes. The whole performance is breathtaking.

Museum of Wax Moulage

Wax moulage of Gertrud P., who had been infected with smallpox during the 1921 epidemic in Zurich. moulagen.uzh.ch

The level of skill that has gone into the displays at the fascinating Museum of Wax MoulageExternal link at the University of Zurich is off the charts. Unfortunately, so is the level of revulsion.

Moulages are incredibly lifelike casts of skin diseases or injuries used to train doctors, often dermatologists; nowadays they are usually made of rubber or latex, but the ones in Zurich are all wax. Noses with leprosy, eye ulcers, ear abscesses – it’s all here in glorious life-size realism. Check out the face of Frieda W.External link, who picked up smallpox in Zurich in 1921 (warning: it’s very realistic).

“The real wax objects of teaching and research moves the viewer in a unique way,” says the museum. “The Moulage Museum has enough material for a thousand nightmares,” says this websiteExternal link. “Admission is free, but they should actually pay YOU.”