The guests of the village of. Smilyan can visit the ethnographic collection “Smilyan Beans and Rhodope Terlets”, which is located in the community center “Asen Zlatarov-1927”. It was opened on 11.05.2005. In the museum collection you can see the Smilyan bean appliqués made by Smilyan children of different age groups. You can see for yourself that children’s imagination has no limits.
Guests of the village can take part in the making of the largest Smilyan bean panel, with which the inhabitants want to apply for the Guinness World Records. It depicts the clock tower, which is the emblem of Smilyan, the plough traditionally used in processing the beans, as well as the millstone, the bean plant, the Roman bridge, the Arda River and the Rhodope kettles.
The Ethnographic Museum collection also touches upon another tradition that has been preserved to this day – the making and embroidery of Rhodope terlits, which are an integral part of the Rhodope costume. The village has long been known for its skilled craftswomen of embroidered Rhodope terlits. The terlits are made of home-woven woolen cloth – aba or shayak. They are cut into two parts and covered with gaitan. The next step is the patterning, which is done with serma. The darning is usually done by hand.
It was only in the first decades of the 20th century, with the advent of sewing machines, that craftswomen began to pattern the terls by machine. To this day, they continue to make amazing ornaments and motifs with serma and gaitan, arousing the admiration of locals and tourists. Today’s people of the mountains jealously guard the age-old tradition in the works of the old masters-dulgers, carvers, craftsmen. Farming, animal husbandry, logging and woodworking are the main livelihood of the Smilyans.
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