The Hotyek family of coopers

The expertise and tradition of the craft of coopering have been passed down from father to son for more than a hundred years in the Hotyek family. People engaged in the making of products in the coopering industry have been living and working in Erdőbénye since the early 1800s. These objects are closely linked to grape processing and winemaking. This is why the work of barrel-making craftsmen was – and still is – important in the historic wine region of Tokaj. The sessile oak and the Tokaj wine are available locally to make products of excellent quality. Coopers made not only wine barrels but also grape-harvesting vessels, kitchen tools, flower vats, tubs for ageing wine and other objects of everyday use out of wood. Nowadays sauna vats as well as barrels for ageing palinka and other decorative items are much sought-after.

Coopers in the Hotyek family: Antal Hotyek (1900–1968), István Hotyek (1930–2010), Attila Hotyek (1958), Zita Hotyek, an apprentice, (1985) and Ákos Hotyek (1988).

Antal Hotyek started working as a cooper in the early 1900s. He made barrels in small work communities and then in the local cooperative. His two sons and his son-in-law also carried on the coopering craft. After his years of apprenticeship István Hotyek was a wine cellar worker in a large winery in Tokaj-Hegyalja, where he did maintenance work, taking care of the barrels and repairing them. He made barrels on top of this job, in his home workshop. Attila Hotyek began to use the knowledge he inherited from his family and the knacks he learnt as a young man after he graduated in viticulture and viniculture, at the age of forty. He makes 1,200-1,300 vessels of various sizes and shapes in his modern workshop, which he opened in 2004.

Zita Hotyek was a regular in the family workshop already as a teenager, and she managed to master the fundamental knacks of the craft during these years. She now makes small barrels all on her own.

After completing his professional training, Ákos Hotyek continued his studies in Germany for six years, after which he had such expertise that helped him to significantly expand the product range of the family business. These days Attila and Ákos work together in the family workshop in Erdőbénye, where they not only pursue their craft but also regularly hold open workshops for groups of visitors who go there. Attila received the Masterpiece of Hungarian Craftsmanship Award of the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry five times between 2007 and 2016. Many vessels made by Attila and Ákos have received the applied folk art qualification. Zita was awarded the title of Young Master of the Year at the Festival of Folk Arts in 2014.