Text By Patricia Platt
Photo Courtesy of the CT-Asia Cultural Center

Norfolk residents and visitors will want to add the Connecticut-Asia Cultural Center to their list of local places to visit this spring and summer. On April 1, the center, at 207A Westside Road, reopens for a new season. The museum will be open to the public during the first weekend of each month from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tour guides can be requested, and the center will try to accommodate all requests. 

Opened last August in the renovated “Stone Castle,” the cultural center includes a museum of Asian religions and art from around the world. The museum has three floors of exhibits dedicated to Eastern cultures: Taoism on the first, Confucianism on the second, and Buddhism on the third. The ground floor contains an exhibit on the property’s history and an art gallery. The current show in the gallery is on Canadian and Taiwanese art.

The center is also hosting a variety of free special events this season. A series of Spiritual Cultural Seminars will include a discussion of the cultural exhibits in the museum and a complimentary dinner of Asian cuisine. The seminars will be held on the first Saturday of the month, from April through November. 

To foster community outreach, the center will present two events at the Norfolk Hub in Station Place. On April 27, there will be a talk at 6 p.m. on the center’s history and its various activities. A celebration of the Dragon Boat Festival will held on June 17, with food, crafts, historical information and a small dragon boat for children to sit in. Please contact the Norfolk Hub to register for these events.

In August, during Weekend in Norfolk (WIN), the center will have a special exhibit on the Inca and pre-Columbian cultures of Peru.

For more information, visit the center’s website, ctasiaculture.com.