Vesene kyrka

The church's most striking feature is its solid stone construction, with walls up to a metre and a half thick and few openings, suggesting it may have served defensive purposes as well as religious ones over the centuries. One tradition holds that the building first served as a crown storehouse before becoming a church, though this is not firmly established. In 1764 the original structure was extended eastward by about nine ells (roughly 2.5 metres), gaining a three-sided chancel, and it was probably around this time that windows were opened on the south and east sides; the north wall and west gable remain windowless.

By the late nineteenth century there was serious discussion of abandoning the cramped, dark old church in favour of a new building on a nearby hill, but the plan came to nothing. Instead, a thorough restoration took place in 1926, uncovering earlier decorative work, and further changes followed, including a new porch with an integrated vestry built in 1978 to replace an older nineteenth-century porch. A freestanding wooden bell tower beside the church dates from 1736 and was rebuilt in 1844; its two bells were cast in the 1850s at Keillers mekaniska verkstad.

Inside, the organ loft dates from 1741 and is decorated with painted figures of the Apostle Paul and Martin Luther. The flat ceiling was painted in 1778 with scenes including Christ's Ascension, the promise of the Crown of Righteousness, and the watchful eye of God. On the north wall survive fragments of a medieval wall painting from the 1200s, uncovered during the 1926 restoration, alongside a medieval wooden sculpture depicting the Last Judgement, showing the dead rising from their graves.

The font's stone bowl is medieval, carved around 1200, while its foot is a modern replacement designed to harmonise with the older stone. The late-medieval winged altarpiece carries carved scenes including the Crucifixion flanked by the apostles; a section of its imagery was rearranged in the early eighteenth century. The pulpit is unusually combined with a small vestry, where clergy could once change vestments at the foot of the stairs, and it was fitted with a sounding board in 1778. Some further medieval carvings associated with the church, including a wooden Madonna figure and a triumphal crucifix, are now kept at Borås museum rather than in the church itself.