The Paphos Ethnographical Museum is a privately assembled collection of Cypriot domestic and rural life, displayed in the family home of its founder, the late George Eliades. The rooms hold costumes, agricultural tools, furniture, household objects, and folk-religious items collected from across the Paphos district over decades. The result is idiosyncratic and personal, closer in spirit to a private collection than to a public institution.
The museum is in the Old Town of Paphos, a short walk from the Town Hall Square.
A Family Collection
George Eliades was a Paphos lawyer with a serious interest in Cypriot folk tradition. Across his lifetime he collected objects from across the district — wedding costumes, looms, oil presses, agricultural implements, kitchen tools, religious icons — and from the 1950s onward displayed them in the family house. The collection has continued under the family since, and the displays still carry the quality of a personal arrangement rather than a curatorial one.
What to See
The collection includes:
- Traditional Cypriot wedding costumes, district by district, with the embroidery characteristic of each.
- A working loom and weaving equipment from the village of Fyti.
- Oil presses, threshing sledges, and other agricultural tools.
- A kitchen reconstruction with traditional cooking equipment.
- Folk-religious objects: small icons, votive pieces, household altars.
- The family chapel on the grounds.
Photography is generally allowed.
Visiting from Annabelle
Reception will arrange a taxi to the Old Town; the museum is a short walk from 28th October Square. Pair the visit with a walk through the Old Town of Paphos and a stop at the covered municipal market — the three together give a coherent sense of the city's working life past and present.
Find your way to the Paphos Ethnographical Museum on
Google Maps.