Person sewing a piece of fabric onto a piece of animal hide with a decorative orange embroidery design.

Cultural Heritage Tour in Țara Silvaniei

ROMANIA / 2025

Discover the surroundings of Marin village, a non-touristic area from the N-V of Romania, as seen through the eyes of a woman who calls it home.

The tour explores traditional textiles, embroidery, wooden churches, village homes, and dowry rooms of a mixed Romanian-Hungarian region mostly overlooked by tourism. During the tour, you will meet local elders, women who share their the stories of their textiles, visit wooden churches, local collections and join hands-on workshops to learn embroidery and ceramic decoration techniques directly from our artisans.

Accommodation is provided in a restored traditional house from 1903, adorned with the furniture, textiles and heirloom of Marina’s grandmother, offering a warm and personal connection to the region and family heritage.

Join Marina from Made in Sat on a personal journey

A young woman and an elderly woman sit outside a blue house, engaging in conversation. The young woman has long brown hair, is dressed in a purple top and khaki pants, and is writing in a notebook. The elderly woman is wearing a blue top, a headscarf, an apron, and floral pants while sitting on a chair. There is a wooden pallet and a leaning stick against the house, with a small round container on the ground nearby.

Visit grandmothers and some of the inspiring women from my village.

Explore their dowry chests and incredible personal textile collections.

An elderly person with wrinkled hands wearing traditional embroidered clothing, folding or displaying colorful embroidered fabric with floral and geometric patterns.
An elderly woman dressed in traditional embroidered folk attire, including a white blouse with colorful embroidery, a black headscarf with floral patterns, and earrings, outdoors with a blurred natural background.

Mothers, artists, storytellers, young wives, housekeepers, creators, farmers, informal teachers, innovators, changemakers, workers, women of the countryside who nurture, build, and inspire.

An elderly woman smiling and waving at a woman with long brown hair, who is standing outside an open door, with sunlight shining through sheer curtains.
Two women, one elderly and one young, wearing traditional embroidered clothing, inspecting embroidered textiles on a table in a cozy room.
A woman is kneeling, smiling, and presenting her hand to a seated older woman who is showing her embroidery. The room is decorated with traditional embroidered textiles on tables and walls.

Embroidery, ceramic decoration and glass painting workshops

Three women gathered around a table, closely examining a piece of embroidered fabric. The woman in the middle, wearing glasses and a white embroidered blouse, appears to be teaching or explaining something to the two women on either side, one wearing a colorful headscarf and the other with bright red hair and glasses.

You’ll have the chance to learn directly from artisans and take home the knowledge of these traditional techniques.

This tour is designed to foster genuine connections between you and the local community.

We believe that meaningful travel is not about the number of places you visit, but about the depth of your experiences.

To ensure that each participant has a truly personalized experience, we am offering only three spots on this tour. The small group size will allow us to connect more deeply with one another and the people we meet along the way.

We are happy to have by our side our partner artisans, the embroidery power-team Viorica Marian and Maria Opriș, the only sheep skin artisan of our region - Viorica But, the inspiring beadsnecklace artisan Florica Gancea and our ceramic historian and friend Szabo Attila.

Group of women sitting at a table in a wooden room, engaged in a craft activity, with colorful yarns and tools on the table, one woman standing and looking down at the others, smiling.
A person holding a decorated ceramic bowl with black botanical illustrations and handwritten words, sitting at a rustic wooden table with art supplies.
People working on a colorful, embroidered leather bag surrounded by various craft supplies on a wooden table.
A person hand-stitches embroidery on a fabric stuffed animal with a needle and colorful thread.
Person holding a glass panel with painted blue, red, yellow, and green floral designs, surrounded by art supplies and paint on a red-striped table.
Seven women, four are sitting at a table and three are standing behind them, smiling and showing embroidery hoops and fabric with stitched designs in a wooden room with a window and artwork on the wall.

Traveling Supper Club

This tour is hosted in collaboration with our friend Steven Santander from Traveling Supper Club, passionate traveling chef who loves creating authentic culinary experiences. Lunches and dinners are thoughtfully prepared by them, using fresh local ingredients and a whole lot of care. His food is bold, colorful and artistic, each plate being a conversation starter for all the participants.

Three bowls of traditional Mexican dishes on a striped orange and pink tablecloth. The central bowl contains orange-colored soup, possibly a lentil or squash soup, topped with small fish and black pepper. The top left bowl contains a mixed bean and vegetable dish, and the top right bowl contains a bright orange hummus-like dip garnished with black sesame seeds and topped with dark roasted vegetables.
Person with tattoos on arm sharing food at a dinner table with a variety of dishes, surrounded by other people.
Two women smiling and enjoying a meal at an outdoor dinner table with candles and a variety of planted foods, during sunset in a garden or backyard.
Four painted cards on a table with red and white striped cloth, depicting colorful still life scenes of food and wine arrangements.
A rural landscape with rolling hills, scattered houses with red and white roofs, trees, and open fields under a clear blue sky.
A woman with tattoos on her arms, wearing denim overalls and a choker, holds an elaborate, colorful, beaded headdress on her head while smiling outdoors in a garden under a green leafy tree.
Three women having a picnic in a lush green yard with a large tree, hanging bucket, a hammock, and a glass pitcher of dark-colored beverage on a table.

ITINERARY

Day 1:

  • Welcome to Cluj & travel together to Sălaj

  • Presentation of the local traditional costume and visit our ethnographic collection

  • Lunch at grandma & see her dowry chest and textiles

  • Walk around the village

  • Dinner

Day 2:

  • Breakfast

  • Visit a craftswoman in a near-by hamlet

  • Visit an ethnographic collection of textiles & outdoor village museum

  • Lunch

  • Visit an elderly woman from the village to see her dowry chest and personal textiles collection

  • Dinner

Day 3:

  • Breakfast

  • Traditional ceramic decoration workshop

  • Lunch

  • Embroidery on sheepskin workshop - waistcoat technique

  • Dinner

Day 4:

  • Breakfast

  • Visit two wooden churches in Sălaj County with a local guide

  • Visit a reformed church with coffered ceiling Crasna

  • Lunch

  • Visit a sheepfold and taste the local handmade cheese with palinca

  • Dinner

Day 5:

  • Breakfast

  • Travel to Țara Călatei (Kalotaszeg) & walk around one of the villages to admire the architecture

  • Visit two Hungarian dowry rooms

  • Lunch at a gastronomical local point

  • Return to Cluj-Napoca in the afternoon

Testimonials

Madalina

““Participating in the tour was a unique opportunity for me to discover Sălaj, new ethnographic areas and to meet people who keep traditions and crafts alive. Every moment, from visits to the homes of the locals, access to their lives, objects and stories, to the workshops of embroidery, lacemaking, pottery or the tour of the wooden churches, seen from a new perspective, was a fascinating foray into the cultural heritage of the region.

It was not just a glimpse into the past, but also a change of attitude: I went with the thought that I would connect spiritually with a culture and be part, even for a few days, of a way of life that is slowly but surely disappearing. However, I left knowing that we all have the opportunity to actively contribute to preserving local traditions and cultural richness, by exposing them, documenting them and then promoting them (I know for sure that I will use the sewing techniques learned here for a quilt in the future).

It's something you can't easily replicate on your own, you effortlessly access a type of experience where time dilates and you manage to use every moment meaningfully and enjoy authentic connections, both between participants and organizers (thank you), and with people in the community.”.”

Rose
“Meet lots of interesting talented people and indulge yourself in Romanian rural life and culture. If you are interested in embroidery, weaving, spinning etc, and traditional skills and you would like to eat Romanian home cooked food, this is a fabulous opportunity. I was inspired and energised by my tour, every day was full of interest.”

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