The only surviving manor in Lithuania that had the right of fief (the property belongs to the family as long as there are living heirs) with all the values of the wooden manor architecture heritage preserved. When you come to visit the most luxurious diamond of Kuršėnai, we invite you to travel back to the 19th century and feel the elegance, values, and beauty of the exclusive manor palace.
After admiring the magnificent, almost 210-year-old masterpiece of wooden architecture – the Kuršėnai Manor Palace – visitors can walk along the park paths leading to the banks of the Venta River, where a century-old linden alley and one of the longest pedestrian bridges in Lithuania – 262 meters long – reign.
By the decision of King Sigismund Augustus in 1564, Kuršėnai with 162 valakas of land, on the recommendation of the Samogitian elder Jonas Chodkevičius, went to the Polotsk citizen Jurgis Mykolas Despot-Zenovičius (1580 – 1640).
The estates of the Kuršėnai Manor were transferred to the Pacas, a noble family that was actively accumulating power in Lithuania at that time. The Pacas took over the Kuršėnai Manor in 1621, and the owner of the manor was Stepanas Pacas (1589 – 1640), a clerk and a tax collector of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
In 1631, by order of King Sigismund Vasa of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Kuršėnai Manor was granted perpetual fief to Jurgis Gruževskis (1651–1651) for his services in the Livonian War. The manor was ruled by seven generations of Gruževskis. The current Kuršėnai Manor Palace was built by Prussian masters in 1811–1812, and the surrounding park was transformed from natural to landscape.
Over the years, the purpose of the manor buildings has changed. In 2000, the Folk Art and Crafts Center was established in the Kuršėnai Manor Palace. In 2006, the center became a budgetary institution - the Šiauliai District Municipality Center for Ethnic Culture and Traditional Crafts. In 2011 - 2012, the reconstructed manor office building was adapted for the center's activities. In 2021, the Kuršėnai Manor Palace building was restored and opened to visitors on July 6. It houses the Šiauliai District Municipality Center for Ethnic Culture and Traditional Crafts and a calendar exposition, which consists of about 5,000 pcs. calendars.
The Šiauliai District Municipality Ethnic Culture and Traditional Crafts Center intensively fosters and popularizes traditional crafts characteristic of the Šiauliai region: pottery, wood carving, ribbon weaving and braiding, egg-shaped printing, wool felting, wicker and straw weaving through educational programs and events. This center also creates conditions for producing, presenting, and selling national heritage products, conducting traditional crafts and other training, organizing lectures, conferences, international and republican creative camps, organizing expositions, exhibitions, conducting educational training, participating in joint district and regional cultural programs, activating tourism, developing traditional crafts, and passing on regional traditions from generation to generation.
In addition, this center organizes regional, republican and international projects that provide children, youth, disabled people, community members, seniors, and guests with the opportunity to learn about old crafts. Material is collected about traditional crafts, craftsmen, the techniques they use, decoration, and examples of works of art, and cooperation with folk artists is carried out, and experience is shared in order to preserve the authenticity of the craft and promote the demand for the consumption of traditional products.
Therefore, if you admire old Lithuanian folk crafts, come and take away only the best impressions by participating in educational programs designed for visitors of all age groups.
The most popular education courses held at the Kuršėnai Manor Palace and Office:
- "In the clay master's workshop"
- "Tea drink with real Kuršėnai roll"
- "Let's get some felt"
- "Colorful threads - for weaving and weaving"
- "Secrets of Lithuanian Straw"
- "Traditional crafts on the paths of knowledge"
- "Easter Egg Ornaments"
- "Wicker weaving"
- "Strip weaving"
- "Secrets of Wood Carving"
- "The Tale of the Woodpeckers"