THE SITE
The Open-Air Museum of Lithuania, established in 1966 on the shores of the Kaunas Lagoon, is one of the largest open-air ethnographic museums in Europe, encompassing approximately 195 hectares and a collection of 155 buildings with around 95,000 objects. The museum presents a comprehensive representation of the historical way of life, work, and traditions of both rural and small-town communities from all five Lithuanian ethnographic regions: Dzūkija, Aukštaitija, Suvalkija, Žemaitija, and Mažoji Lietuva (Lithuania Minor). It is the only museum in Lithuania that brings together architectural and cultural expressions from all these regions within a single site.
The museum landscape recreates a condensed image of Lithuania from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. Authentic wooden homesteads, mills, barns, chapel pillars, and agricultural structures, relocated from across the country and carefully reassembled, illustrate regional variations in building traditions, craftsmanship, and social organisation. Through these ensembles, the museum conveys how architecture, tools, and spatial arrangements reflected everyday practices and local identities.
A network of historic houses, gardens, orchards, and fields extends along a circular route of several kilometres, surrounded within forests, meadows, and undulating terrain. At the centre lies a reconstructed township fragment, where demonstrations of pottery making, woodworking, amber processing, and linen weaving illustrate the continuity of artisanal knowledge. The museum also addresses difficult historical experiences, notably in its Deportation and Resistance Sector, which commemorates the twentieth-century repression and exile of Lithuanian populations.
As a whole, the museum functions as a cultural landscape dedicated to the preservation and interpretation of ethnographic heritage, where built structures, craft traditions, and social memory together express the diversity of Lithuanian rural culture and its transformation over time.
THE PROJECT
The European Heritage Volunteers Project focuses on the practical conservation of vernacular heritage elements preserved within the Open-Air Museum of Lithuania, using traditional craft techniques that reflect historical modes of making, maintaining, and valuing rural environments. The programme is conceived as an applied learning experience in which participants engage directly with the material expressions of Lithuanian vernacular culture.
Hands-on work will centre on the conservation of painted wooden heritage using traditional conservation methods for polychrome surfaces. Under the guidance of restorer-conservators from the museum, participants will be introduced to the techniques, materials, and working processes historically used to decorate and maintain wooden devotional objects installed in the open-air environment and therefore subject to natural weathering. Through these conservation activities, participants will gain insight into the relationship between craftsmanship, religious expression, and local identity in Lithuanian rural communities.
In parallel, participants will learn how to construct traditional wooden fences characteristic of linear village landscapes, particularly those associated with the Žemaitija ethnographic region. The process will include preparing timber elements, assembling structural components, and understanding how such fences historically contributed not only to enclosure and protection but also to the visual order and coherence of homestead environments. This work highlights how modest construction practices formed an essential part of the cultural landscape and everyday life.
The project responds to the gradual disappearance of traditional craft knowledge in contemporary society. By practising these techniques directly, participants contribute to the transmission of skills that were historically passed from generation to generation and that remain essential for the maintenance of vernacular heritage. The emphasis is placed on learning through doing, recognising craftsmanship as a bearer of cultural meaning as well as a practical means of conservation.
The educational component will complement the practical work through contextual sessions led by museum specialists, addressing the ethnographic significance of the museum’s collections, regional building traditions, and the role of craft in shaping rural identity. These activities situate the hands-on interventions within a broader understanding of how material culture embodies social history.
An integral element of the educational programme will be the participants’ presentations. Each participant is required to prepare and deliver a presentation related to the thematic focus of the activities on site, introducing a case study from their country of origin. This component connects the practical work undertaken during the programme with comparable heritage practices in different cultural and institutional contexts. Through this structured exchange, participants reflect on conservation approaches, management frameworks, and current challenges, contributing to a broader comparative understanding of heritage preservation. The presentations are intended to encourage critical dialogue, intercultural exchange, and the articulation of informed professional perspectives within an international group of emerging heritage practitioners.
The project will take place from August 2nd to August 16th, 2026, and is organised by European Heritage Volunteers and the Open-Air Museum of Lithuania.
