Nalichniki.com — virtual museum of carved wooden window frames of Russia

Virtual museum · since 2007

Window frames (aka Nalichniki), wooden houses, doors, carved balconies — we collect, preserve and study photographs of wooden architecture details together with contributors from around the world. It all started in 2007 almost by chance — with a hundred colourful windows in Engels.

The archive now holds 24 102 photos from 1 095 cities and villages, by 469 photographers.

Browse Photos How it all began

What's here

Photo Archive

All photos by location, photographer and building.

Map

The same photos on a world map — see where carving styles differ and which regions are still waiting for photographers.

'leaf opens to the right' and 'leaf opens to the left.' And all would be well, except…

the FernFest festival, all tickets for it were sold out, so even though it opened only an…

learn the theory and practice of historical dimensional woodcarving. Over four days you'll immerse yourself in the distinctive…

shipping of calendars and assembly models entirely on my own, as I have until now — neither new models nor a continuation of the…

Or whether they're creatures at all — perhaps just fragments of ornament. These…

I didn't photograph the house I showed in the previous post in full — there's only the one shot (the one that appeared there), so here I'm including a different one, also with anchors. The reason for anchors…

the first batch of calendars arrive straight from the press. Literally fourteen hours ago the second (and final) batch arrived — and meanwhile ALL the calendars whose…

frame and… already posted that one… this one’s blurry… this one’s just not interesting… this one I can’t figure out how to crop… Bad, bad, bad… Then you go out and…

acroteria — one on the left of the crown, one in the center, one on the right. These were…

keep myself from laughing again. — Why wouldn’t I? They dictate someone’s phone number…

for a moment, but the moment I raise my camera to photograph the carved drainpipe I've only just noticed (and, if I'm honest with myself, to provoke some further…

settlement... workers' settlement now. But be that as it may, the nalichniki here are…

Blog

Occasional field notes: conversations with locals, plans, finds and exhibition announcements.

Shop

Scale models, books, postcards and posters.

Photo Archive

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From the Blog

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Carved Tomsk 2026

Last June, my wife and I went to Tomsk for our wedding anniversary, and it turned out there was a nalichniki festival going on. We showed up, mingled with everyone, made a bunch of new acquaintances. Last time I'd been…

I Took It Personally

...I'd left the car somewhere on the roadside wandered a couple of houses away — and got sucked in. Now I can't quite work out which lane the poor thing is standing in. I move from house to house hoping to sort out…

Heading out on a new nalichniki route.

Heading out to photograph another batch of nalichniki on roughly this route. I'm essentially opening two entirely new regions for myself: Volgograd and Astrakhan Oblasts. If you know of anything interesting — anything…

Lecture in Moscow. Nalichniki: History, Elements, Meanings.

It's been quite a while since any lectures. On March 24th at 7:00 pm at the Istok Centre I'll be giving a talk: "Nalichniki: History, Elements, Meanings." Over two hours I'll explain what houses looked like before…

Upcoming event · September 24

The formula of needlework, exhibition and sale. (Moscow, Main Stage space on Ball Bearing Street)

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Cooperation

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