The 27 Inch Dolls that Saved Fashion in Post-War Paris

Even Hitler couldn’t rob Paris of its style. In 1945, the end of the war was in sight, the French capital had already been liberated of the Nazi occupation and it was time for Paris to relaunch its fashion industry. There was just one problem– the industry couldn’t afford enough fabric to actually create new fashion.…

Ibiza’s Long Lost Utopian City Built Inside a Bouncy Castle

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 city on the northern coast of…

The Weird and Wonderful Wheels of Jay Ohrberg

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 turned carmaker from Illinois is arguably America’s most creative and innovative…

She Built a Candle Empire from her Ancestral Village in Mexico

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, in all its kaleidoscopic and ornamental mastery, is upheld by a single…

Fabergé’s Secret Garden

When we hear the name Fabergé, we instantly think of those exquisite Imperial eggs; the mystery and intrigue surrounding their loss and rediscovery following the Russian revolution. But in truth, the goldsmith’s real and most potent love affair of the 20th century was one with flowers. The value of Fabergé flowers is enhanced by the…

She was the Hostess of Greenwich Village a Hundred Years Ago

Marie Marchand, better known as Romany Marie was one of those eccentric characters that stood out in a town full of them. During the first part of the 20th century, her informal Greenwich Village cafés drew a society of artists, anarchists, activists, playwrights, musicians and bohemian intelligentsia. If you were looking for la vie bohème…

Indulge in the Underrated Influence of Erté

An artist like Erté was unlikely to go by unnoticed in history with his profound obsession for the arts, spanning from dance to theatre and film to high fashion and beyond. The visual wizard arguably coined the Art Deco aesthetic with a signature style that continues to inspire modern design today and yet, his name…

Don’t be a Tourist in Mexico!

An escape plan to Mexico is always a good idea, no matter who you voted for! With our American readers in mind during these surreal times, we’ve compiled a beginner’s off-beat eBook guide to high-tailing it across the border, ya know, just in case. While Mexico of course deserves its own book, we’ve picked out…

Discovering Hollywood’s Secret “Palm Springs” of Arizona

While everyone and their mother went to Palm Springs during Hollywood’s Golden Age, the real stars snuck away to Scottsdale, Arizona. Basking under the Sonoran Desert sun in America’s Southwest, Scottsdale has long been a hushed hideaway for Hollywood weekend runaways ever since its first hotels quietly rose up from the desert like a mirage…

The Vault

Rainbow Boat Houses of Puerto Rico

They call it Isla del Encanto, Island of Charm. On the coast of southern Puerto Rico, in a little-known town called Parguera where 90 floating houses perch over the Caribbean Sea on the world’s most bioluminescent bay. This dreamy little town is still inhabited by the ancestors of the first 10 families that build their homes…

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