The Living Fence – Ohrdruf, Germany - Atlas Obscura
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The Living Fence

Ohrdruf, Germany

Made from trees and then abandoned, this fence is still growing along a path in Germany. 

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Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
Marc von Vahl/Used with Permission
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In the small town of Ohrdruf, in the state of Thuringia, there’s an abandoned fence made entirely from trees. 

Sometime in the 1930s, a local doctor wove Swedish whitebeam and dogwood trees into a fence along a street called Benjaminsgrund. The fence is more than 300 feet long.  

Around 1945, the man who made the fence was ousted from his land. It’s not clear exactly why, but starting in November 1944, Ohrdruf was also the site of a Buchenwald subcamp and later became one of the first concentration camps to be liberated by Allied forces, in April 1945. The fence was later incorporated into a holiday camp run by the German Democratic Republic, and it continues to grow today. 

trees abandoned plants nature architectural oddities architecture
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East German Bunker Museum
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