A donkey savors warming temperatures after a long winter at the zoo in Warsaw, Poland, on Wednesday, April 8, 2015. (Photo by Czarek Sokolowski/AP Photo)

Secondary school graduates play in a fountain as they celebrate the last day of school, traditionally called the “last bell” in central Kiev, Ukraine on May 31, 2019. (Photo by Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters)

A man protesting the Ferguson grand jury decision to not indict officer Darren Wilson in the Michael Brown case is arrested while marching through the streets on December 1, 2014 in New York City. Brown, an 18-year-old black man, was killed by Darren Wilson, a white Ferguson, MO police officer, on August 9. (Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

While communism, collectivism, worms, dry rot and casual looting failed to destroy the majestic wooden churches of Russia, it may be ordinary neglect that finally does them in. Dwindled now to several hundred remaining examples, these glories of vernacular architecture lie scattered amid the vastness of the world’s largest country. Just over a decade ago, Richard Davies, a British architectural photographer, struck out on a mission to record the fragile and poetic structures. Austerely beautiful and haunting, “Wooden Churches: Traveling in the Russian North” (White Sea Publishing; $132) is the result. Covering thousands of miles, Mr. Davies described how he and the writer Matilda Moreton tracked down the survivors from among the thousands of onion-domed structures built after Prince Vladimir converted to Christianity in 988.

A child walks to an installation made from fallen leaves by college students, in shape of a sofa, to call for people's attention to environment protection, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China, December 6, 2016. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

A rainbow appears over the Louisiana gulf May 26, 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico near Brush Island, Louisiana. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Revelers pose before the start of the Los Angeles Pride parade on June 9, 2019 in West Hollywood, California. The 49th annual parade, celebrating LGBTQ identity, drew thousands to the streets of West Hollywood. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Washington Nationals third baseman Anthony Rendon and reporter Alex Chappell are doused with water after the game against the Miami Marlins in Washington on August 30, 2019. (Photo by Brad Mills/USA TODAY Sports)