Ekshärad Cemetery is well known for its graceful and imaginative iron crosses.
About the cemetery
The Ekshärad Cemetery is one of Sweden's most distinctive historic cemeteries, renowned for its remarkable collection of hand-forged iron grave crosses. Rather than rows of conventional stone headstones, many graves are marked by elaborate wrought-iron "trees of life" (Swedish: livsträd), creating a landscape unlike almost any other cemetery in Scandinavia. Over 450 forged iron crosses, most of them from the 1700s and 1800s, are preserved.
Iron crosses were frequently used in the cemeteries in Värmland until the 1900s, but they were not functional and became outdated so they started to disappear. People started to throw them away or sell them. This happend in Ekshärad Cemetery as well, and for many years their home was on the outside of the cemetery. Luckely, they choose to put the iron crosses back in the 1920s.
*Source: www.visitvarmland.se
*Photo source: www.mapio.net
Contacts
Swedish federation of Cemeteries and CrematoriaSveavagen 116
10432 Stockholm
Sweden
e-mail: kansli@ignis.se
Tel: +46 81 50540
Fax: +46 86 128036
Tourist information
Tourist Information about Sweden HouseP.O. Box 7542 SE-103 93
Stockholm
Sweden
Tel: +46 8 789 24 00
Fax: +46 8 789 24 50