Inside a Secret Paris Atelier of Curiosities

Behind what might be the narrowest door in Paris, at the back of a peaceful courtyard, I could hear the faint sound of a radio crackling as I approached the end of a corridor, hoping I’d found the atelier of Maïssa Toulet. I had found a photograph of her work on Tumblr and tracked her…

Seeing Double: The Titanic’s Ghostly Twin Sister

What if we told you that history’s most infamous ocean liner had a twin sister? What’s more, one that lived (almost) happily ever after? As we mark 112 years since the Titanic sunk to the bottom of the ocean, we’re hopping aboard the “Olympic,” the identical ship that was made in tandem with its ill-fated sister.…

The Secret World of Pageant Pigeons

They’ve been increasingly antagonised over the last century, reduced to nothing more than a plague upon Midtown Manhattan, Trafalgar Square, Notre Dame (we could keep going). But today at MessyNessy, your internet watering hole for misfits and chic oddities, we’d like to show you that pigeons, yes pigeons, can meet those two categories with flying colours.…

Tracing the Real Betty Boop back to a Notorious Bootlegger’s Club in 1920s Harlem

The 1920’s in Paris may have been roaring, but over in Harlem, they were stomping. New York’s playground was not short of an underground boozer, but there was one place in particular that dominated the scene; The Cotton Club. Patron Saint of jazz, notorious bootlegging and the home of the original Black Betty Boop. It…

Built in the Clouds, they’re the Highest Villages Frozen in Time

When you’re looking to escape the tedium of modern and mainstream tourism, sometimes the only way is up. Today, our armchair travels will take us to some of the most remote (and highest) villages in the world, from Europe to middle America to Egypt. But of course, we’re not just going to drop you on…

Who’s Afraid of Adolf Wölfli?

Some artists leave us tangled legacies– reputations tied up in creative theft, family feuds and unresolved estates. Others, like Adolf Wölfli, leave us a veritable Pandora’s Box for consideration. At a glance, Wölfli’s work oozes the sentiments of Psychedelic art; its kaleidoscopic swirls of colour look fresh off the Haight Ashbury, circa 1967. In truth,…

It’s about Time we Reinvented the Autochrome

Show me an Instagram filter that can do this and I’ll personally take you out to dinner so that we can become lifelong friends. Autochrome is a dead art – a secret recipe – if you will, that has been long lost to the modern world, left uncharted by 21st century technology and yet to be…

The Bittersweet Story of the World’s First Motel

It’s as American as Apple Pie in all its neon-lit glory, evoking our collective cultural memory of 1950s road-tripping, film noir fugitive hideouts and the golden age of kitsch. The motel is as much a part of the American open road as the gas station and the roadside diner, an indispensable amenity to the roving motorist; the…

New York’s Secret Caribbean Kingdom (and its Queen)

Peer inside and your senses inevitably tumble inside a place that’s more time capsule than bar. In the warm glow of a colour we’ll just call, “Yellow, 1979”, exists a world apart from the modern and fast-paced New York City we know. You’ll hear the salsa rhythm of a lively San Juan watering hole and…

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These Futurist 18th Century Observatories were probably built by Time Travellers

To add to the mystery, no one is actually sure when they were built. Located at several sites scattered around central and Northern India, it’s been estimated the colossal astronomy instruments were constructed as early as 1710. But is it just us, or do these structures look like they came straight off a Star Wars…

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