 While there, she became interested in folklore and tried her hand at designing costumes.She and her friend Elizabeta Mamontov also worked to create a folk museum, travelling as far as Yaroslavl to make sketches and collect folk tales, and taught classes in traditional crafts to the local peasant families.Together with Viktor Hartmann, Viktor Vasnetsov and others, she helped make Abramtsevo the center of the Arts and Crafts movement in Russia.