Once it is open, a museum visitor can directly enter the exhibition space of the Cuckoos, a room of approximately 1,450 square base, where the walls are covered with 16-foot-high screens with photos of black forest trees in different seasons. (The museum instructed the images of a specialist in forestry photography.) About two-thirds of the clocks of the collection hang there, with the Kaiser Wilhelm clock hung on itself in a small side room and the rest of the collection that is stored in storage.
“It will be like entering the black forest,” said Mr. Mceaney, 70, while he was standing, surrounded by scaffolding and ladders, in the early 19th-century building, which had been a methodistic chapel and, more recently, a private theater.
The first exhibition visitors will see is a Black Forest Fairground Organ, built by Gebrüder in 1825 to play more than 50 tunes. The eight-foot long organ, part of the cuckoo collection, must be hung about nine foot of the museum floor and a hologram of a child will seem to wind it three times a day.
“Children will like this,” Mr. Mceneaney said, “I am very aware that I can get children interested in history. The cuckoo bells will be interesting for them because of all the beautiful engravings. And of course, the cuckoo themselves!” (Once the Koekoek attraction is open, access to both the museum and the cuckoo attraction will be 10 euros for adults, free for children under 12.)
Mr McEeaney and Rupert Maddock, a local architect, supervise the renovation of the building, an estimated € 1 million. They started moving the first clocks from Mount Congreve to the museum in March, but Mr. Mceneaney noted that it would take months to hang them all. “It’s an absolutely huge job.”
Mr Curren said that he was convinced that the collection would improve the reputation of Waterford as the center of horology in Ireland. “There are many no -sayers, but this creates jobs in this community,” he said. “More than 115,000 people bought tickets for the museums in 2024, and Waterford has a population of around 60,000. It is a cultural part, but it has an economic goal for this city.”
And Mr. Boles, a lifelong collector who grew up with a cuckoo clock on the wall of his bedroom in the youth, repeated the comment. “Clocks can sound a bit Stodgy for some people, but cuckoo bells sound a lot more exciting.”
