Wooden Architecture Trail of the Silesian Voivodeship

1,060 kilometres of routes and 93 historic wooden landmarks make up the Silesian section of the Wooden Architecture Trail, created through the cooperation of the Silesia, Małopolska and Subcarpathian voivodeships. Churches, chapels, bell towers, cottages, inns, forester's lodges, a water mill or granaries show what the old villages of Upper Silesia and the Podbeskidzie foothills looked like.

Loops and the Main Route

Visiting is made easier by the division into sections: the Main Route (326 km) runs across the entire voivodeship, linking Gwoździany with Jeleśnia and further with Lachowice in Małopolska, while five loops — Częstochowa (180 km), Gliwice (160 km), Pszczyna (135 km), Rybnik (130 km) and Beskid (120 km) — make multi-day trips possible. The picture is completed by two open-air museums: the Upper Silesian Ethnographic Park in Chorzów and the Pszczyna Village Heritage Park.

The oldest timber in the region

The trail's oldest buildings are considered to be the All Saints churches in Sieroty and Łaziska, raised in the mid-15th century; dendrological research from 2011 dated the church of St Martin in Ćwiklice to 1466. The route also features the church of St Michael the Archangel in Katowice from the 16th century, the church in Miasteczko Śląskie from 1666, St Barbara's in Bielsko-Biała Mikuszowice from 1690, St James's in Szczyrk from 1797–1800 and the Kawulok cottage in Istebna. Ethnographic and historical exhibitions — in Częstochowa, Gliwice, Ustroń, Wisła, Żywiec or Milówka — round off the story of the region's wooden culture.