Heading to Croatia? Take a day out of your seafood sampling sessions and your seaside tanning stints for a visit to the country’s quirkiest attraction; The Museum of Broken Relationships.
Heartbreaks are generally viewed as something to forget, but Croatia’s Museum of Broken Relationships is flipping the concept of heartbreak on its head in a super creative way. Located in the country’s capital city of Zagreb, the museum hosts an extensive collection of artefacts and mementoes from failed relationships.
At first glance, the collections may seem like a bizarre curation of bits and bobs. Walking around, you’ll see anything from a jar of a woman’s tears, to shoes and clothes, to locks of hair and tins of food – even espresso machines. Some of the mementoes are hilarious, and super relatable (ever nicked something from your ex to get back at them?) and some of them verge on heart-wrenching as you delve into the backstories behind these fascinating items.
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It’s also fascinating to see how a breakup can be turned into a positive experience, and an opportunity for growth.
The highlight? The museum’s newest exhibition, which focuses on dating in the digital age. In the past, physical artefacts and possessions of the person you broke up with could be easily chucked in the bin if you wanted to forget about them, or, depending on how things ended, kept in a safe place for reminiscing. But now that so much of our dating lives are online, it’s harder to phase someone out forever. Sure, you can delete a text thread – but you never know who screen shot it.
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The new exhibition explores the digital souvenirs we keep from break ups, including break up texts, tinder profiles, snapchat screenshots and social media rants. If (like me) you’re a self-confessed dating app veteran, it’s equal parts hilarious and oddly unnerving to gain a new perspective on the implications of dating in the digital era. You’ll likely find yourself nodding along as you inspect long WhatsApp messages that are scarily similar to the one you got 2 years ago that you’ve archived, but haven’t quite brought yourself to delete.
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Although some of the souvenirs in the museum may hit home a little more than others, the entire experience is super positive and will leave you pondering how you think about love and romance. Definitely worth a visit, for both hopeless romantics and relationship skeptics alike.