The first St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Telšiai was built in 1867, on Vilnius hill, replacing the demolished wooden Catholic church and the former city cemetery. It caused great outrage amongst local residents. Unrest began; petitions to the czar were drawn up. In 1932, already by decision of Supreme Tribunal of the Republic of Lithuania, after paying a compensation, the church was handed over to the Catholics and in 1935 the Orthodox community acquired a piece of land on the Northern part of the city on a hill and entered into agreement with Kaunas-resident architect V. Kopylovas regarding drawing up of a new draft for the church. The original cubistic solution can be linked to his studies in Prague (he graduated from the Polytechnic Institute in 1933) which was one of the hubs of this architectural style in Europe.
The layout is based on a square, built up by a cube of 10x10x10 m, crowned by an onion dome and surrounded by a massive, uneven cornice characteristic of cubism. The same uneven cornice, widening at the top, was used on apse and porch on the Eastern and the Western sides of the building. White level walls were interrupted by narrow windows. A three-story high XIX century iconostasis was transferred to the church from the former one.
After the war the interior was supplemented by a then unusual balcony, around the year of 2000 the roof was relayed and the windows and the electrical wiring were fixed. The building is a very rare cubist-style object in Lithuanian architecture, whereas the use of such style in a sacred object is unique altogether.
Marija Drėmaitė