One of the most heartbreaking cultural losses of the conflict in the Ukraine is the Ivankiv Historical and Local History Museum, which Russian forces burned down. Most notably in the Kyiv collection are 25 works by Ukrainian folk artist Maria Prymachenko, who garnered internation … | Continue reading
On New Year’s Eve in 1969, drag as we know it came kicking and screaming into the world. Just before the midnight movie at the Pagoda Palace, the raucous sounds of Offenbach’s can-can crackled over the speaker system. Out sprang a chaotic kick-line of queers in ragged vintage dre … | Continue reading
Even some of the greatest names in art history; Paul Cézanne, Édouard Manet, Camille Pissarro and James Whistler; were once rejected by the art world. In 1863, the “Salon of Painting and Sculpture” had been going strong for almost two centuries, showcasing the work of promising y … | Continue reading
In an age where we almost entirely rely on our smartphones and satellites orbiting Earth to tell us what direction to go in, imagine traversing thousands of miles of open ocean using only your senses. This is how the first people who populated the islands of the Pacific Ocean tra … | Continue reading
1. Marseille’s Transporter Bridge (and Restaurant) inaugurated in 1905 and destroyed in 1944 Demolished by the Nazi army in an attempt to block the port during the liberation of the city. At the top of the bridge there was a luxury restaurant while at the water’s edge a mobile pl … | Continue reading
One of America’s most iconic train journeys of the past is making a comeback, for it is now possible on special occasions, to ride the tracks that hugs the banks of New York’s Hudson River northwards on one of the most luxurious trains to ever grace the rails – the 20th Century L … | Continue reading
What if we told you that just about every painting you’ve seen of Marie-Antoinette was created by a woman? Overlooked for two hundred years, Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Le Brun was one of the most celebrated portraitists of the late 1700s. She painted all of the most glamorous women o … | Continue reading
Before the days, and nights, of Ibiza’s club-culture tourism and world famous pool parties that popped up in the early 1980s, a peculiar inflatable structure appeared on the island a decade earlier, and no, it wasn’t a blow-up bar. In 1971, a bunch of hippies built a DIY utopian … | Continue reading
In 1918 a group of American men and women from the American Red Cross wound up in Siberia where they encountered 782 Russian summer campers and their teachers. The schoolchildren were from Saint Petersburg, and had been away at summer camp when a violent war broke out. They fled … | Continue reading
1. Trapani Coral In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a notable production of works by experienced masters flourished in Trapani [Sicily]… The history of Trapani coral however has its origins much before and as early as the twelfth century, that famous Arab traveler, Muh … | Continue reading
What do you love most about Paris? Perhaps it’s looking up at all the limestone detail of Haussmann’s grand boulevards or getting lost down a cobblestone street leading to a hidden bucolic courtyard. Those classic grey zinc roofs that provide the perfect reflection for the city’s … | Continue reading
What do you love most about Paris? Perhaps it’s looking up at all the limestone detail of Haussmann’s grand boulevards or getting lost down a cobblestone street leading to a hidden bucolic courtyard. Those classic grey zinc roofs that provide the perfect reflection for the city’s … | Continue reading
The passage up the Blue Nile has always been both a physical experience and an allegorical tale. Thousands of years after pharaohs were ferried to the afterlife on golden barges, the steamboat began transporting mesmerised 19th century tourists past their temples in search of som … | Continue reading
Imagine gathering around a dinner table with the guy who stole the Mona Lisa, an heiress who stole a Vermeer, the “gentleman thief” responsible for some of the most sensational art thefts in Europe, and let’s throw an invite to Pablo Picasso for good measure, for his own attitude … | Continue reading
In 1934, a young woman stepped off the train in Los Angeles’ Union Station. Even in a city swarming with beauties, eyes would’ve fastened on her. She was astonishingly lovely — tall and lithe, with dark glossy hair she wore pulled back in a style that offset her porcelain skin an … | Continue reading
1. The Man Who Crawled the World Meet performance artist Pope .L “who traversed a substantial portion of New York City (and parts of Europe) on his hands, knees, stomach, and elbows, wearing everything from a Superman costume to a sports jersey and Nike sneakers”. Pope L “has p … | Continue reading
“Saverio Bongiorno had no permanent home and had been living in various midtown hotels. Bongiorno registered at the Edison Hotel on Sunday, with a small beach bag as his only baggage. He was assigned to room 1135 and nothing more was seen or heard of him…James Gerrity, chief hous … | Continue reading
Meet us for dinner in Paris under the Iron Lady … circa 1900? Over the 135 years since the Eiffel Tower was built, there have been some surprising additions that have come and gone from the site of city’s most iconic landmark. In our archives, we’ve shared the tower’s various tra … | Continue reading
Ah the psychedelic 60s, what a time to be out of your mind. It’s easy to assume bohemian beatniks, free lovin’ hippies, and prog rockers popularised mind-bending medicines to everyday folk, but let’s go back a step before we start spiralling. Who’d have thought that American coun … | Continue reading
In the waters of the Caspian Sea, about 40 kilometers from the coast of Azerbaijan, lies an intricate network of bridges and man-made platforms which is currently home to around 2,000 people. Encompassing about 17 miles, this real-life water world is a veritable city called Neft … | Continue reading
On West 140th Street and Lenox Avenue today, a drab supermarket squats in front of a housing project. It’s hard to believe that in the 1930s, the most famous dance club in the world stood on this dreary spot. Back then, the block was dominated by a two-story building with an enor … | Continue reading
Agatha Christie has outsold Stephen King and J.K Rowling combined by about 2 billion books. Her work ranks only behind Shakespeare’s and the Bible as the most widely published books in history. And when she killed off one of her principle characters, Hercule Poirot, The New York … | Continue reading
Corsets could be blamed (among many things) for preventing a lot of women throughout history from living their best lives, but Camille du Gast was not one of them. She was a self-styled “exploratrice” with a mind of her own and a penchant for speed. If you weren’t familiar with a … | Continue reading
While the Beatles were singing “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah” in England, continental Europe was forming its own musical phenomenon. The French called it, Yé-Yé, literally derived from the “yeah! yeah!” lyrics that had become the sound of British and American rock and roll. In … | Continue reading
Like her mother and grandmother before her, Ginevre King was named after Leonardo Da Vinci’s portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci. And she had many parallels with the Italian aristocrat: King also came from immense wealth and would be most remembered for how she was depicted by one of h … | Continue reading
He has designed the “Ghostbusters” ambulance car, the “Knight Rider” car, the RoboCop car, the “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle'” van, the Pink Panther mobile, and just about every impressive televised car worth a mention. Step aside Elon Musk, this truck driver and stunt racer turne … | Continue reading
Berlin is a city of ghosts and one of the most alluring phantoms is Anita Berber, the high priestess of debauchery; she of the kohl black eyes and flaming red hair and vermillion lips. Immortalised by Otto Dix’s paintbrush, this Weimar cabaret goddess challenged all the taboos wi … | Continue reading
Those of us who paid any attention in history class can probably recount a few key details and players of the French Revolution – there was Marie Antoinette, her Sun King and their posse at Versailles who were eating too much cake; the revolutionaries who kicked things off by sto … | Continue reading
You know the sound of ragtime even if you don’t think you do. “The Entertainer“, a classic piano rag, is one of the most recognisable melodies of the 20th century (go on, have a quick listen). But it was written by America’s greatest musician that we’re betting you’ve never heard … | Continue reading
Georges Méliès was an illusionist, in every sense of the word; a man who revolutionised cinema forever. He played an indispensable role with his innovations, creating the world’s first film studio, the first fictional film and when it comes to the invention of special effects in … | Continue reading
If you thought the antiques business was on the decline, you only need to step inside the Galerie Kugel to realise you might have had it wrong. Familiar with Paris? You’ve likely ogled at this mansion on the banks of the Seine a dozen times before, and yet never dared to assume y … | Continue reading
As 2021 came to a close, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted on charges of sex-trafficking in connection with her former partner and accomplice, Jeffrey Epstein. However, it wasn’t her misconduct or the salacious details of her lifestyle that went viral, but rather … | Continue reading
Why is it that the bad guy always inhabits an incredible spread? It seems every self-respecting movie villain needs a strategic hideaway to devise all their evil plans, so let’s take stock of some memorable cinema locations for movie villains with a weakness for Modernist design… … | Continue reading
The saying is that behind every great man there is a woman. In the case of Henri Matisse, that woman was not considered to be his wife of 40 years, but a penniless refugee who was barely surviving in 1932, when she found temporary work with the French modern master. Her name was … | Continue reading
They aren’t remembered for their political or intellectual outpourings, nor for their radical actions in the streets. The only weapons of the Zazou were dress, speech and attitude, and yet, this Parisian subculture somehow came to be a thorn in the side of Nazis and French Fascis … | Continue reading
Neo-Victorianism – a curious and persevering movement of reproducing, or in some way, reinterpreting, Victorian ways of life. This includes, but is not limited to, wearing top hats, corsets, silky waistcoats, an appreciation for Jane Austen, Alice in Wonderland tattoos and morbid … | Continue reading
Black Panther swept the box office when it came out in 2018 and quickly became one of the top grossing superhero movies of all time. While it not only boasts a predominantly Black cast, it is one of the few modern films truly centred around Black heroes. There is still a long way … | Continue reading
The generation that came of age in the aftermath of the First World War and the Spanish Flu did a lot more than just bob their hair and drink all the time. Well, they did do those things too, but let’s take a closer look at those party animals of the roaring 20s as we… | Continue reading
A remarkable year perhaps it wasn’t. Life as we know it seemingly remained on pause in 2021; in limbo and on shaky ground. It was about finding some kind of “normal” in the aftermath of chaos, picking up the pieces and figuring out if they’re worth gluing back together in the exa … | Continue reading
It’s hard to imagine anyone ever salivating over a quivering tower of jellied meat, but for centuries – that’s right, not just the seventies – it was the height of haute cuisine. A hundred and fifty years ago, if you were an ambitious chef out to knock the socks off your guests, … | Continue reading
I’ve been yearning to get back across the pond for a good ol’ dose of “weird America”, but I tend to forget that my own country has some pretty odd, quirky and wonderfully nostalgic sights to see when you venture off the main road. Wes Anderson would have a field day with Atlas d … | Continue reading
On paper, she is Britain’s lost surrealist; an English debutante who cut herself off from her wealthy family, fell in love with Max Ernst and eloped with him to Paris, finding herself in the centre of surrealist movement. Separated from Ernst by war, she later ended up in Mexico, … | Continue reading
Coudenberg Palace was once the envy of all of Europe. It had everything you could want in an opulent royal residence; a monstrous banqueting hall that dazzled guests with its sublime décor, sumptuous apartments filled with works by important artists like Rubens, and extensive gro … | Continue reading
You arrive at the gardens after nightfall with the full moon casting a cool, pale glow over the muggy evening. Two dozen torch bearers stand by to light your way, and as you approach the crowd, you sense the anxious anticipation of the delights to come. Soon the musicians strike … | Continue reading
When the grand mansions of America’s Gilded Age were being built, no expense was spared; from the finest stones for the exterior to decorating every nook and cranny inside with extraordinary, lavish detail. The same luxury was applied to the entertainment on offer; after all, bei … | Continue reading
The importance of ritual candles is celebrated in many cultures across the world. Their beauty is hidden in the hope and magic that persists until the last ray of beeswax-powered light, and the tradition preserves valuable ancestral storytelling and history. Zapotec candle making … | Continue reading
The art and science of the enclosure of space is all around us, shelter-creation being traditionally its key function but oftentimes architecture is also a mouthpiece for broadcasting a message through carefully crafted iconography. So-called ‘alternative’ structures vary from in … | Continue reading
When the world wide web entered our homes in the mid 90s, the French must have been feeling a distinct sense of dejá vu. After all, anyone in France with a telephone had been online an entire decade before the internet came along. From 1978 to 2012, there was Minitel, one of the … | Continue reading