Do you have an old-fashioned or even a modern-day pennant at home? The treasure hunters at the Agricultural Museum have taken those pennants out of the drawer and put together an exhibition that's a true feast for the eyes – "Out of the Drawer: Bunting Exhibition."

Back in April 2015, the supplement "Targu Talita" of the newspaper "Maaleht" issued a call-to-arms: "We're Searching for Information About Collective Farm and State Farm Badges." The Estonian Agricultural Museum had a burning desire to collect badges from the bygone era of collective and state farms. As part of this campaign, the museum was bestowed with an extensive stash of Soviet-era pennants. The badge-crafting fever really took off in the late 1960s, as a considerable number of agricultural collectives reached the ripe age of 20. However, only the wealthier collectives and state farms could initially afford them. Crafting pennants from fabric, on the other hand, was much more affordable and efficient. They were designed for important events, anniversaries, and a variety of occasions and gatherings. Pennants fluttered at state farms, collective farms, institutions, companies, clubs, schools – you name it. Mostly simple, suitable for hanging as souvenirs, but there were also more elaborate, decorative table pennants.

Multiple subsidiary businesses of the collective farms were responsible for crafting badges and pennants. For example, pennants were made at the Johannes Lauristin Collective Farm, while badges were produced at the Loksa Collective Farm. If the everyday souvenirs of that time – badges, glasses, and towels – were predominantly crafted with rather impressive artistic finesse, the design and execution of pennants were, let's say, a tad more uneven.

This exhibition is part of the "Out of the Drawer" series, aiming to showcase items from the museum's collection that need a little "finger-on" approach to arouse curiosity. In our collection, we have over 350 pennants, nearly the same number in the scientific auxiliary collection. In this exhibition, we present pennants that we believe are visually captivating and characteristic of their era.

So come on over, spot familiar pennants, count how many roosters-hens-chicks are on them, or tally up how many pentagons adorn those Soviet-era pennants (hint: it's fewer than you might think!)