Dismantling and rebuilding
1995 to 2003
In 1995 the old house was to make way for a modern farm building. To keep this architecturally valuable house for the municipality of Altmünster, the decision was made to take it down and rebuild it elsewhere.
For this purpose the “Association for the Rescue and Preservation of Historic Building Culture in the Municipality of Altmünster” was founded in December 1995; it was renamed “Kulturverein Eggerhaus” in 2002. From December 1995 to April 1996 the house was measured precisely, documented and carefully dismantled. Every removable part – window frames, grilles, floors, ceilings, log walls, roof structure – was numbered and stored properly.
After a long search, the municipality helped find a suitable plot near the SOS Children's Village in Altmünster. Rebuilding began in August 1998. Apart from bricks replacing the stone walls, up to 70 centimetres thick, everything stayed as it was.
Once the ground floor was finished, the original log beams and roof trusses – up to 17 metres long – were repaired and fitted together like a giant jigsaw puzzle with long wooden pegs. The topping-out ceremony in October 1999 marked the first big milestone.
In 2000 the roof was covered with larch shingles and the original floorboards and ceilings were put back. As so often, installation, restoration and furnishing turned out to be the most demanding part, in time and money. The “Prize for the Promotion of Folk Culture” in December 2001 gave the Eggerhaus team a real boost.
From the start of surveying in December 1995 to the opening on 16 August 2003, a group of dedicated volunteers put in almost 20,000 hours of unpaid, often highly skilled work. With support from local businesses, the municipality of Altmünster and the state of Upper Austria, they saved a building that had seemed lost.
