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Cabinet of Chic Curiosities
Category / Nostalgia

The Wholesome Lost World of Competitive Barrel Jumping

Whilst exploring the abandoned Grossinger’s holiday resort in New York’s Catskill mountains one last time before it was torn down, something caught our eye in the crumbling ruins of what had once been the ice skate house. Propped up against the wall was a large wooden sign that had been left behind. Dusty like a…

An Ode to the Lonely Bandstand

‘A bandstand is, merely an empty shell unless music is played upon it,’ so laments Pavilions for Music, a website dedicated to the humble bandstand. Indeed, these empty shells with their elaborate ironwork and faded glamour, rushed past by commuters, utilised as climbing frames by children, smoked upon by teens and generally taken for granted…

The Remains of Maryland-In-Africa

The ruins of Harper, Liberia are as beautiful as they are complicated… In 1833, a group of 2,769 formerly enslaved and and freeborn African Americans settled in the town of Harper on the west coast of Africa. They were part of a new colony called Maryland-in-Africa that sought to “repatriate” free Black Americans throughout the…

America’s Arabian City Explained

The largest collection of Moorish Revival architecture in America and the Western Hemisphere is where you’d least (or maybe most) expect it: Florida. A development project before it’s time, from the vision of 1920s aviation and motorcycling pioneer who was inspired by One Thousand and One Nights, Opa-locka in Miami-Dade County has street names like…

A Forgotten 1920s Magazine Gives a Glimpse of the Paris Jazz Age in the Flesh

Just how folles were the “Années Folles”? In the digital archives of the French National Library, I stumbled upon a few clues, in vibrant colour. “Paris Plaisirs” is a long-forgotten monthly revue that appears to have been published sometime between 1922-1938 (possibly earlier) from 12 Rue Georges-Berger in Paris – and there’s virtually nothing else…

When Buffalo Bill was the Toast of Paris

Americans in Paris. Hemingway, Josephine Baker, Jim Morrison, James Baldwin, Nina Simone – these are the names and faces that typically come to mind when we think of those who left their mark on the French capital. But a bison-chasing cowboy doesn’t exactly fit the profile of the American intellectuals, writers, artists and musicians who…

When They Say ‘Haussmann’s Paris’, What Do They Mean?

Walking through Paris, as a tourist or a local, it’s hard to miss the sense of harmony that the city exudes. The standardized buildings, the parks, the long angular streets that seem to always lead to a landmark. Everything feels intentional, organized, and connected. This isn’t by chance, this sensation is largely thanks to the…

The Legend of the Little Renault that Could

The French have arguably mastered the art of slow living in the name of joie de vivre, and perhaps nowhere else has this been best demonstrated than on the cobblestone streets of Montmartre, which for many years, played host to the world’s slowest race… The story goes that one New Year’s Eve in 1898, a…

Dangerous Dancing Dandies were the Bad Boys of the Belle Epoque

The Paris of the Belle Époque saw the emergence of a certain type of street outcasts; a subculture that combined killer style with the criminal underworld. They were known as, les Apaches. They lived in secret dens in the city outskirts, shunned the idea of honest labor and took their name from the allegedly savage native American…
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