Val Gardena, South Tyrol, Dolomites, Italy Dec 20, 2023

The Val Gardena valley in Northern Italy is renowned as a tourist destination for skiing, rock climbing and woodcarving enthusiasts. Don"t let the model village appearance fool you, Val Gardena is a real, yet magical site in the Dolomites of South Tyrol that transforms in winter. Wooden huts open their doors to visitors, and a nostalgic cable car ride, each cabin adorned with twinkling fairy lights, travels above the village. During the 18th century, the valley became famous for its production of statuettes and intricately carved wooden figurines, which were initially crafted to decorate Catholic churches. Amongst those creations, the peg wooden doll emerged as one of Val Gardena"s best-known products and is still being produced today.

© Ingus Kruklitis/Getty Images

palette

Today in History

Dec 20, 2024Santa Claus Village in Rovaniemi, Lapland, Finland
Dec 20, 2025Red fox

More Desktop Wallpapers:

July 1, 2026Dungeon Provincial Park, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
Feb 5, 2025Scottish Blackface sheep, Aberdeenshire, Scotland
Mar 19, 2024Tree frog on leaf
Apr 25, 2025Magellanic penguins, Volunteer Point, Falkland Islands
Dec 8, 2025Domaso, Lake Como, Italy
Jan 10, 2024Mylopotamos, Greece
Jan 3, 2025Radcliffe Camera and All Souls College, University of Oxford, England
Sep 1, 2023Turkey tail mushroom
Jul 18, 2024Coral reef in the Indian Ocean, Mayotte, France
Feb 16, 2024Pyrrhuloxia bird
Oct 13, 2023Vieste, Apulia, Italy
Feb 2, 2024Alpine marmot
Oct 6, 2023Taughannock Falls State Park, New York, USA
May 27, 2025Heidelberg, Germany
Nov 8, 2024Glacial rivers, Iceland
Aug 15, 2024Hang Sơn Đoòng, Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, Vietnam
Jan 22, 2026Karlovy Vary, Bohemia, Czechia
Feb 23, 2024Haghartsin Monastery, Armenia
Apr 6, 2026Hirosaki Castle with cherry blossoms, Hirosaki, Japan
Oct 28, 2023Castilla-La Mancha, Spain
Apr 22, 2026Alam-Pedja Nature Reserve in Tartu County, Estonia
Nov 29, 2025Red deer stag in De Hoge Veluwe National Park, Netherlands
Aug 24, 2025European fallow deer, England
Jun 27, 2024Duomo Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence
Mar 2, 2024Modica, Sicily, Italy
Dec 30, 2023Daiichi Tadami River Bridge, Fukushima, Japan
Jul 12, 2025Thomsons gazelles
Dec 15, 2024Lake Misurina, Dolomites, Italy
Sep 3, 2024Crystal Lake in the Enchantments, Washington, United States
Jun 22, 2024Amazon rainforest, Brazil