Communal Laundry Basin from Ebsdorf

Replica

The washing area in the Open Air Museum is a replica of the facility still existing in Ebsdorf. Its model, one of the few communal laundries areas in Hesse still intact and with a working spring, was originally at the edge of the village, immediately adjacent to the former livestock market, a strategically important place in village life. The original structure is a rectangular basin enclosed with sandstone blocks. It was probably built between 1780 and 1820 in Ebsdorf. The laundry facility, which is also known to locals as Steeborn (stone well), is located near today’s community centre and can still be viewed. When water pipes were laid in 1914, the communal laundry area ceased to be regularly used.

By the end of the 1990s, it had become necessary to re-design the water use in the Open Air Museum, so the first reconstruction of the village washing area was removed. The second reconstruction, inaugurated in 2012, is at the edge of the Central Hesse Ensemble, just as its model in Ebsdorf was situated at the village’s border.