A Salvadorean clown going by the name of “Almohadita” poses during National Clown Day celebrations at Beethoven Square in San Salvador December 3, 2014. The Salvadorean congress declared the second Wednesday of December as National Clown Day to honour all Salvadorean clowns in their efforts to bring fun to the country, reported local media. (Photo by Jose Cabezas/Reuters)

English Lop Eared Rabbits on the judging table on January 28, 2012 in Harrogate, England. Approximately 3,000 animals attend the annual show, which runs over two days and was first held in 1921. The Rabbit Grand National, attracts competitors from as far afield as Sweden to Yorkshire. (Photo by Bethany Clarke/Getty Images)

Blue, white and red brassieres, the colours of the French national flag, hang from a balcony in Marseille, France, November 27, 2015 as the French President called on all French citizens to hang the tricolour national flag from their windows on Friday to pay tribute to the victims of the Paris attacks during a national day of homage. (Photo by Jean-Paul Pelissier/Reuters)

Dilwyn Green, from North Wales, holds his 7 month old Gold Silkie Bantam which won a 1st prize in its breed at the Poultry Club's 2011 National Show on November 19, 2011 in Stoneleigh, England. (Photo by Oli Scarff/Getty Images)

A girl cover her face while riding a motorcycle as haze shrouds a street near Tanjung Siapi Api port in Palembang, on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, September 19, 2015. Indonesia will take 30 days to bring smouldering forest fires under control, the national disaster management agency said on Friday, as smog from the fires pushes pollution in Southeast Asia to record highs. (Photo by Reuters/Beawiharta)

Male orangutan Percy is reflected in the Sekonyer River as he reaches over to try and touch a wooden klotok boat carrying crew and tourists, in Tanjung Puting National Park, in Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo), Indonesia, September 4, 2013. Percy is a son, born and living in the wild, of a female orangutan named Princess, a freed former captive orangutan that anthropologist Dr Birute Galdikas rescued, rehabilitated and returned to the wild. (Photo by Barbara Walton/EPA)

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.

Runner-up. “The heavens opened and the streets around Shibuya, Tokyo, were suddenly drenched in even more colour and movement. I was taking photos (my friend was holding the umbrella) when I noticed this woman at the crossing. I’m pleased with the futuristic feel of the image”. (Photo by Katherine Bridgestock/The Guardian)