Herring Era Museum
Maritime museum in restored quayside buildings telling the story of Iceland's herring boom.
Siglufjordur was the centre of Iceland's herring fishery in the first half of the twentieth century, and for a time one of the busiest ports in the country. A volunteer group began restoring the derelict Norwegian salting station of Roaldsbrakki in 1989, and the Herring Era Museum opened there in 1994. The project expanded along the quay over the following decade until it became the largest maritime museum in Iceland.
The museum occupies four linked buildings. Roaldsbrakki, dating from 1907, shows salting work and the cramped quarters of the women who gutted and packed the fish. Grana, opened in 2003, reconstructs a 1930s reduction factory with working machinery that rendered herring into oil and meal. The Boathouse of 2004 holds vessels moored at an indoor quay and doubles as a concert space, and the Old Slipway covers boatbuilding. The museum won the Micheletti Award in 2004.
Highlights
- Roaldsbrakki, a Norwegian salting station of 1907 with the herring girls' lodgings
- Grana, a reconstructed 1930s reduction factory with its machinery in place
- The Boathouse, with vessels at an indoor quay and an occasional concert stage
- Micheletti Award for the best new industrial museum in Europe, 2004
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