Welcome to Klaverens Hus

In Sweden there have been about 280 factories for making hammer instruments (pianos). The first workshops opened their doors c. 1750, the last factories closed c. 1985. A tradition of 235 years is broken, maybe for ever.

Many piano factories also made reed organs for use in homes, schools and churches, but there were also a great number of factories that only made reed organs. At the end of the 1960s this production had come to an end.

The Society of Klaverens Hus was founded in 1998. Its purpose is to preserve the memories of this part of Swedish industrial and cultural history in a living keyboard instrument museum, where the instruments are allowed to sound whenever it is technically possible.

The vision of Klaverens Hus is twofold. Firstly, it is a museum with a collection of instruments and reconstructed factory rooms with tools and machines, representative of developments in Sweden. Secondly, it allows activities that are links between the past, the present and the future - a workshop for care of instruments, research, concerts, courses for musicians and piano technicians, and editing of publications and recordings. Additionally, archives and libraries for reading, listening and studies of video recordings are being created.

The Klaverens Hus is located in Söderhamn where the city and the property company Vågbro Fastigheter AB support our work. We co-operate with, among others, the Swedish Piano Tuners' and Technicians' Association, the Swedish Piano Teachers' Union, the Söderhamn city library, Söderhamn's Chamber Music Association, Musik Gävleborg, Hälsingland's museum in Hudiksvall, the Stockholm Music Museum and the Royal College of Music in Stockholm.