Kluknava – Shoe Museum, Hornád Bridge and Green Point

Kluknava can be explored through its crafts, industrial history, sacred buildings and landscape. This Slovak destination offers diverse insights: you can trace the development of shoemaking, view technical monuments and historic buildings, follow an educational trail through the natural surroundings or head to a viewpoint above the town.

Shoe Museum and Shoemaking in Kluknava

A central cultural attraction is the Shoe Museum exhibition in the heritage-listed Dom služobníctva s hospodárstvom near the centre of Kluknava. The museum presents shoes used from prehistoric times to the present day. The museum also includes the Kluknavská chyža. There, you can see a shoemaker’s room and workshop, historic tools, shoes and figures in historic folk costumes. This combination of an exhibition and a reconstructed working environment makes the history of the craft visible in two different forms.

Technical Monuments and Historic Buildings

Among the prominent structures is the covered wooden bridge over the Hornád River. It connects Kluknava with the settlement of Štefánska Huta, is classified as a technical monument and was built in 1832. Štefánska Huta is also home to ruins originating from Europe’s first factory for the electrolytic production of copper. This factory was built between 1845 and 1848. Another testimony to the history of technology is the water mill with a Francis turbine in Kluknava, dating from 1910.

The town’s historic architecture also offers its own highlights. The Baroque manor house in Kluknava is of Renaissance origin and dates from 1715–1720. It belonged to the Kluknava-Iliašovce branch of the Csáky family. The Church of Saint Catherine of Alexandria was built in 1555 as an originally Protestant Renaissance church. Following extensive restoration in 2012–2013, its interior was modernised with new mosaics. The church continues to be used for religious purposes.

Educational Trail, Viewpoints and Religious Sites

The “Personalities and History of Kluknava” educational trail provides a way to explore the surrounding area. The circular route is approximately 7.5 kilometres long and leads mainly through natural surroundings. The information panels also contain English texts. Another landscape attraction is the Green Point observation tower above Kluknava; it is about a 1.5-hour walk from the town. In the wider landscape, the Chapel of Saint Anne stands in the nearby forests of Kluknava. It continues to be a pilgrimage site. Believers come there every year on the last Sunday in July.

For views of other places, you can also visit Nalepkovo, Gelnica and Margecany.

Roháčka and the Landscape of Čierna hora

Roháčka is part of the area’s landscape profile: at 1,028.5 metres above sea level, this peak is the highest in the Čierna hora mountain range. Around Kluknava, therefore, the focus is not only on museums and historic buildings but also on a clearly defined mountain setting. Together with the educational trail, Green Point and the cultural monuments, this creates a place where natural and historical themes can be explored separately or together.

For the broader travel overview: Gelnica District.