Yekaterinburg Woman Keeps 200 Giraffes at Home

In a small wooden cabinet with glass doors, Yekaterinburg resident Olga Dmitrieva keeps not a dinner service or crystal, but two hundred little giraffes. She became fascinated with collecting everything related to these animals 15 years ago, and recently even opened her own exhibition at the House of Cinema.

E1.RU correspondent Polina Krasnopevtseva dropped by for a tour and learned about the most unusual exhibits. We«re showing them to you too!

“They«re alien creatures”

The first item in Olga«s collection is a small toy made of orange felt with sequins. A former colleague made it by hand and presented it with the words: “I decided you like giraffes,” and the Yekaterinburg resident realized that she actually does love these unusual animals.

“And a month later I got a second [item] — a silver brooch. I had popped into a jewelry store looking for a ring or a pendant, but I couldn«t leave without this beauty,” the collector says.

When friends and acquaintances learned about Olga«s unusual hobby, the number of exhibits grew many times over. Everyone tried to bring an unusual figurine back from a trip or make something by hand to add to her collection.

“Most often the gifts come from close people who know what will make me happy. My daddy works as a teacher at a college and from time to time gives me some unique giraffes made by his students. I«m always very surprised by that. I say: ‘How is that? Your students knit for you without knowing I have a collection?» The mystery of that coincidence has never been solved.”

One of the most unusual exhibits is a skydiver giraffe, made by hand by Olga«s colleague, who devoted many years to the sport. Next to it stands the tallest giraffe, which came from Hungary. It is a wooden figurine one meter (about 3 ft 3 in) tall.

Olga values handmade items most of all — things that exist in a single copy and were made personally for her. The Yekaterinburg resident also loves creative work herself: she attends master classes in felting, stained glass and drawing, where she makes new exhibits for her collection with her own hands. She suggests that this urge was passed down from her mother, who collected postcards in her youth.

“Some people think I«m crazy”

This summer Olga decided to start holding exhibitions. The first to respond was a library in Uralmash (a district of Yekaterinburg): dozens of parents with children came to the opening and looked at the toys with interest. Then the figurines went to the second floor of the House of Cinema, to the exhibition “In the Shadow of the Giraffe.” Olga is grateful to the Union of Cinematographers of Russia for helping to organize it.

“Two more giraffe lovers who also collect them came to the opening of this exhibition. I«ve known one of them for a long time, she»s my closest friend, and I met the second woman here. Her collection is smaller than mine, but still there were moments when she looked at the exhibition and said: ‘Oh, I have one like that too.« There are people who find this just as interesting, while others, on the contrary, think I»m crazy. Everyone has their own quirks, and I take it calmly,” the Yekaterinburg resident says.

The most important thing in a hobby like this is to know when to stop. Olga herself says she has never chased quantity and never spent exorbitant sums on it. And her husband isn«t exactly thrilled that so many giraffes live in the house. He jokes that they stomp too loudly at night.

“It all happens by chance. I«m not so obsessed that I go everywhere I can, to flea markets or fairs. Only if I see one somewhere can I ask about it and buy it. But that happens rarely, because giraffes aren»t cats, they«re not the most common item. I also have good friends who collect squirrels and little cows, and I always look for interesting things for them too,” Olga explains.

For the exhibition, the collector brought about 200 different pieces. Another forty or so stayed at home — glass and ceramic figurines might not have survived the trip. Olga says she has no favorite pieces, they are all equally dear to her, and when asked what all these numerous giraffes are for, she answers simply: they gladden the soul.

“I«m glad I have them. I»m happy when the collection grows and when some unusual exhibit appears. I«m especially happy when giraffes appear that were made specifically for me. It»s very nice that a person spent time, spent effort, spent some of their own resources and didn«t go sell a batch of a thousand, but gave it to me.”

Olga now devotes herself entirely to creative work and paints pictures; before that she worked for a long time in various Yekaterinburg media outlets and corporate press offices. She dreams of visiting Kenya and seeing real giraffes in their natural habitat.

Earlier we reported how a criminologist from Yekaterinburg assembled a substantial collection of unusual souvenirs from colonies and prisons. The scholar was quite surprised by the interest in his exhibits.

And be sure to read about how a Ural businessman assembled a collection of retro cars in his garage.