Experience Guide | Tourism Medicine Hat

Museum Tours The museum can be toured leisurely or guided. Join a guided tour at Medalta, and learn about the prominent faces in the industry, how many fires tried to burn Medalta Potteries down, how the kilns worked, and how a single electric engine ran through each of the rooms, connecting every machine.

Beehive Kilns The iconic beehive kilns were used to fire pottery in the 1900s and were built using medieval designs. The bricks rely on gravity to keep the over head domes together — there is no mortar holding these structures together. The little arches around the base of the kilns was where the fire entered the kilns through long gas pipes. There was so much heat pro duced, it could make a penny evaporate. People can now tour inside the empty kilns, and experience them as music, dance, and art gallery venues during certain times of the year.

Crockstock Festival, We Built This City on Crocks and Bowls Medalta hosted a free, 12-hour festival in September 2022 that featured Canadian performers, Bif Naked and TOQUE, local artists, an Indigenous dance group, and a salsa band. All the food trucks in Medicine Hat fed the community, and there was a market with over 20 local creators and artists. Medalta has a venue room that can be used to host corporate events, fundraisers, Christmas parties, and other special events. Their entire campus is the result of a dedicated restoration effort supported by the local commu nity and all three levels of government. The result is a stunning context for dynamic experiences inside a National Historic Site.

Pottery Collection (Schlachter Gallery)

Tony Schlachter is a prolific collector of Medicine Hat pottery, with his incredible collection of over 2,500 pieces. He donated these pieces in 2008. They represent nearly every factory that ever operated in Medicine Hat. It all began with a nondescript chicken waterer that Tony found on his farm in 1954. These pieces can be spotted in the gallery.

17

nehat .com

@TourismMedicineHat