Picture: The Bastion of the Vilnius Defence Wall, ©Dirk Röder

At the end of January, FORTE CULTURA participated in a workshop in Vilnius on establishing a new Baltic Fortress Cluster. The workshop was conducted by EFFORTS Europe and funded as part of the FORT UNION project between Kaunas (LT) and Giżycko (PL), supported by Interreg Lithuania–Poland. The workshop took place in the beautiful Bastion of the Vilnius Defence Wall – National Museum of Lithuania.

The starting point for the workshop was an EFFORTS contact trip to the Baltic countries in the summer of 2025, during which Daugavpils, Kaunas, Saaremaa, Tallinn and Helsinki were visited.

Now, representatives from fortresses in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Denmark, and Poland presented their sites, including the FORTE CULTURA members Daugavpils, Giżycko, and Suomenlinna. In addition, Alfredas Jomantas (Head of the Division of International Relations and Heritage Dissemination, Department of Cultural Heritage under the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania) and Prof. dr. Valdas Rakutis (Member of Parliament of the Republic of Lithuania, co-founder of former Baltic Fort Route) gave inspiring introductory speeches.

The idea of a Baltic cluster and route builds on the historic Baltic Fort Route concept, “Baltic Culture and Tourism Route Fortresses” INTERREG-III-B-project (2005-2007), originally developed by the minds who later founded FORTE CULTURA. During the workshop, Dirk Röder revisited this story and shared how FORTE CULTURA works today with regional fortress clusters to create meaningful, sustainable tourism offers across Europe.

A successful collaboration with EFFORTS Europe, where FORTE CULTURA contributes its knowledge in route development and cross-border cooperation. The joint vision is clear: Baltic Fortresses as a dedicated sub-route within the FORTE CULTURA Cultural Route.

A strong step toward connecting Baltic heritage through culture, tourism, as well as shared expertise with EFFORTS Europe.