The Harrachov Museum of Glass which forms a part of the glassworks premises, contains a collection that maps over three hundred years of glass-making history in Nový Svět – the collection is complete both from the technological and the historical point of view. The collection as such includes over 5000 exhibits and thanks to its size it is the biggest collection of Bohemian glass from a single glassworks that can be found in the Czech Republic.
View of the glassworks from around 1830.
The white building on the left is the building of the present museum, the so-called Manor House. This building is probably the oldest stone building in the western Giant Mountains – it is thought to be from 1712.
Many say that the story of the Harrachov glass collection is equally interesting and fascinating as the exhibits that it contains. In fact, the collection itself has also "lived through" its share of excitement and even adventure. Before the Second World War, the exhibits that can be seen in the museum today were displayed in the company's sample room by the owners of that time – the aristocratic Harrach family. The sample room contained the best that was ever produced by the glassworks and the owners were very proud of it. Shortly before the first German troops entered Harrachov on October 8, 1938, the owner, Count Jan Nepomuk Antonín Harrach, decided to have the most valuable exhibits walled up in a secret room behind the sample room. The place where the original entrance into the room used to be was plastered and this way, the historic collection was concealed from the Nazis.
The room was hidden so perfectly that nobody was able to find it both during the war and long after it ended. The secret room with the exhibits from the original sample room was discovered again by workers reconstructing the sample room in the 70ies. Only then it was found out what treasure it actually contained. Many precious pieces were unfortunately given away as gifts to different visitors of the national enterprise of that time. In any case, the collection stayed where it was until the company went private. In June 1993, the glassworks was bought by its present owner, JUDr. František Novosad. The new owner had the whole rediscovered "glass treasure" taken out of the dilapidated room, registered carefully and brought into the Manor House building, which he used to build the museum. Since then the room in which the glass was found has been called by the name "13th chamber".