The Town where Unwanted Architecture Found a Home

If you were to take photographs of the most charming villages from around the world and make a collage of their most picture-perfect views, you’d get a pretty good representation of what Portmeirion looks like. An enchanted technicolor mish mash of architecture, built in the 1920s by one wizard of a man, let’s take a…

Window Shop in Art Deco Paris

It was a lucky link I found on Pinterest that led me by chance to the digital image catalogue of the Wolfsonian-FIU, a treasure trove of rare books rescued from obscurity. Deep within the collection of more than 100,000 images, two dog-eared books acquired from the French archives published in the early 1930s have been digitally…

Place your Bets on the Fate of this Crumbling Casino

It was the crown jewel of Romania’s “Monte Carlo”; a pearl watching over the Black Sea where royalty and the elite flocked from all over Europe and wealthy travellers spoke of it around the world, recounting stories of their extravagant gambling escapades at the Casino Constanta. It’s unmistakable art deco shapes and lines are still in tact, and from…

13 Things I Found on the Internet Today (Vol. CXXXI)

1. These school chalkboards frozen in time, untouched since 1917 This week, contractors removing old chalkboards at Emerson High School in Oklahoma City made a startling discovery: Underneath them rested another set of chalkboards, untouched since 1917. “The penmanship blows me away, because you don’t see a lot of that anymore,” Emerson High School Principal Sherry Kishore…

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Greetings from the Colonies: Postcards of a Shameful Past

Of course we’re all familiar with the postcard as a small souvenir we send to friends and family from faraway vacations, or as something we buy to decorate our walls. But are you familiar with the postcard as a form of European colonial propaganda? Postcards were invented around 1860 (at a time when European countries were…

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A Guide to Wes Anderson’s Paris

Did you know Wes Anderson lives in Paris? When he’s not off making one of his beautifully idiosyncratic films, the director keeps a low profile in his Parisian apartment and office, no doubt decorated as charmingly as his movie sets. We’ve been invited into Wes’ whimsical world through his lens, but we know very little about Wes Anderson’s Paris. So…

The Forgotten Bohemian Queen of the Paris Art World: Leonor Fini

Bohemian “It Girl” of Paris, master of surrealist disguise and generally a badass female libertine, Leonor Fini was one of the most photographed people of the 20th century. And yet barely anyone I ask knows her name, even here in Paris, where she once ruled the bohemian Parisian art world, considered one of the few women…

The Island of Royal Pubs

Throughout the Victoria era, Malta was a hive of expatriate activity. The British had arrived and made its naval base there and the royal family found it to be the perfect escape from English winters. To entertain themselves and make the cross-section of civilian society that descended on the Crown Colony more at home, they brought their home comforts…

Mystery Flight to Paradise, 1950

It’s a summer Friday afternoon at the office and all you can think about is: “anywhere but here”! Really, anywhere? In that case, hop aboard the Mystery Flight with Capital Airlines circa 1950… You might end up in the Alps, you might find yourself sipping mojitos on the beach, so pack accordingly. This lady has the right…

Once Upon a Time in Krakow at the Old Jewish Quarter Café

Once Upon a Time in Kazimierz, a little restaurant in the heart of Krakow’s old Jewish ghetto, is better than most museums. Set inside a row of recreated, turn-of-the-19th-century Jewish traders’ shops, it’s arguably one of the smallest restaurants in the city, with eleven candlelit tables offering a dining experience from another century, like walking into…