Part I.  Architectural Aspects  of New History Museum in Lithuania

On September 20th, 2025, on the eve of the National Holocaust Day in Lithuania, among several major events in the country, the new museum of Jewish history Lost Shtetl was opened in Seduva, in the north of the country. The museum is dedicated to preservation of the memory, history and culture of the shtetls, the way of life of Jewish communities in Eastern Europe and Baltic states. The world that has been completely eradicated by the Shoah. 

Apart of small museum in Poland dedicated to shtetl life, a couple of online resources on the theme in Poland and Belarus, and a random exhibitions in New York by the YIVO institute, at the National Museum of Art of Ukraine, the Jewish Museum of Norway,  and the POLIN museum in Warsaw, and various places in Lithuania, this is the newest and largest museum in Europe dedicated to the unique culture and way of live of millions of people that not just vanished on its own distinction , but which was hand-made destroyed and annihilated as a way of life. 

Additionally to the National Holocaust Museum that was opened in Amsterdam in 2024, the Lost Shtetl museum is also the newest Jewish history museum opened in Europe in 2024-2025. It is the largest memorial to the Jewish people and their history in the Baltic states. 

A month before the opening, the museum held a special international commemorative event in late August. It was also a chance to see the newly accomplished museum in detail. I have been following this long and elaborated project since its early stages, almost a decade. In May 2018, along with many people from Lithuania and abroad, I was also present at the ceremony of the laying of a corn-stone of the future building of the museum. To see it completed now has been gratifying. 

In this essay series, I am analysing various aspects of the new museum, its architecture, its interior and exterior design,  the artifacts, and some unique human stories connected and presented there. 

Respectful Memory & Decency of Civility

On 25th August 1941 the Jewish life of one of so many shtetl places in Lithuania, in Seduva, was annihilated. About 700 children, women, elderly and men were cruelly and energetically murdered in the nearby forest.

Eighty four years later, to the date, the time of three and half generations, many people from all around the world whose roots are from Lithuania, and even precisely from Seduva, gathered in the place which is more than two hours drive from Vilnius, to commemorate the solemn date, and to see in advance the new memorial museum which was to be opened in September 2025. 

In this special project, the museum and memorial complex includes a lovingly restored Jewish cemetery and meditative comforting park around the truly remarkable complex of buildings, with smashing in many senses interior design and permanent exhibition.

When visiting Lithuania among three Baltic states with an official visit in the beginning of August 2025, the President of Israel Isaac Herzog  and his wife Michael spent several hours in Seduva at the special mezuzah fixing ceremony of the door of the Lost Shtetl Museum. After a detailed two-hour tour through its premises and the core exhibition, President Herzog called the museum ‘outstanding’. He had a good reason........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)