Orvydas Garden

Vilius Orvydas and his father were stonemasons, and when roadside crosses and religious sculpture were being removed and destroyed in the Soviet decades they began bringing them to their farm, along with boulders, tree roots, machinery and whatever else came to hand, and arranging the accumulation into something between a sculpture garden, a shrine and an act of resistance. Orvydas, who became a Franciscan brother, kept working on it until his death in 1992. The result is dense and strange: crosses, carved figures, hollowed stones, a bunker, a boat, military hardware and religious imagery packed into a small area under trees. It is not tidy, not explained and not to everyone's taste, and it is one of the more remarkable places in Lithuania.

Highlights

• Rescued crosses - the roadside sculpture brought here for safety.
• Carved stone and roots - the Orvydas family's own work throughout.
• The dense arrangement - everything packed under trees on a small site.
• Odd inclusions - machinery and hardware absorbed into the composition.

When to go

May to September, when the site keeps fuller hours and the paths are dry; the garden is atmospheric in mist and rain but muddy. Winter access is limited.

Good to know

There is almost no interpretation, and without knowing the background the place reads as a junk-strewn yard rather than what it is. Paths are rough and uneven. Some sculpture has deteriorated. It is idiosyncratic and divides visitors sharply.

Nearby

Mosėdis lies north; Salantai is beside the site.