The Cabin Hamlet

The cabin hamlet presents leisure culture and outdoor life from the 20th century to the present day. It consists of five cabins from Gudbrandsdalen representing different social backgrounds, and shows how building traditions and patterns of use have changed over time, from the simple standards of the early 1900s to today’s well-equipped holiday homes.

From the 1830s onwards, the Norwegian mountains became a destination for foreign tourists, especially the English. Members of the upper classes were the first mountain tourists. Hiking gradually became popular with broader groups as more people gained leisure time from the 1930s onwards. Increased tourism, new agricultural demands and rising prosperity after the Second World War gradually transformed the traditional summer-farming landscape into a recreation-oriented landscape with many newly built cabins.

The Kinck Cabin 

The Kinck cabin was built in 1911 at Øvre Syljuberget in Mesnali and re-erected at Maihaugen in 1989. Mesnali was already a popular holiday destination by the late 19th century. The railway to Lillehammer opened in 1894, making the area more accessible to visitors.

The author and philologist Hans E. Kinck built his own two-storey cabin in Mesnali in 1911 and spent many summers there with his family until 1926. Kinck was married to Minda Ramm, who was herself a writer and among the first women in Norway to pursue higher education. She was also an active advocate for women’s rights.

Myklebu

Myklebu was built in 1965 at Fåvangfjellet in Ringebu and moved to Maihaugen in 2016. The post-war period marked a major expansion in cabin building for wider sections of the population, with large numbers of small cabins constructed. Myklebu is a simple, typical 1960s family cabin, with a living room, an openplan kitchen and one bedroom with bunk beds.

The Cabin Vy

Vy was built at Maihaugen in 2018.

Vy is the name of a cabin model produced by the company Leve Hytter in Øyer. The design is by the architect Einar Jarmund and is inspired by the historic buildings at Maihaugen, featuring a traditional turf roof and a facade reminiscent of the open galleries of old timber houses. The cabin has a high standard, with two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a kitchen within a spacious open-plan living area.

While older, smaller cabins required minimal intervention in the terrain, modern cabins such as Vy demand far more extensive landscape modifications due to foundations, trenches for pipes and cables, site levelling, and the construction of access roads and electricity infrastructure.

The Trade Union Cabin

The Trade Union Cabin was built at Nordseter in Lillehammer. Construction began in 1959, and the cabin was moved to Maihaugen in 2019.

The cabin originated as a prefabricated Moelven barrack transported to the site in 1959 and later expanded in several stages through volunteer work. It was used by the United Federation of Trade Unions’ local branch, Raufoss Iron and Metal Workers’ Union. After paid holidays was introduced by law in 1936 and strengthened by the Norwegian Holiday Act of 1947, many company- and trade union-owned cabins were built in Gudbrandsdalen for workers to use on weekends and during holidays.

Gråhøgdbu

Gråhøgdbu was built in 1967 at Venabygdsfjellet in Ringebu and moved to Maihaugen in 2021. See how the cabin was moved down from the mountains. 

The cabin was built by the Norwegian Trekking Association (DNT) as a self-service mountain cabin. It consists of a main cabin with eight beds and an emergency cabin with two beds and an outhouse. With Gråhøgdbu, the association completed the high-mountain route for skiers and hikers between Lillehammer and Rondane. In 2020, the cabin was closed out of consideration for the wild reindeer in the area and subsequently relocated. A new DNT cabin, Veslefjellbua, was built outside the wild reindeer zone.