A Brief Compendium of Medical Quackery

The rise of accessibility to medicine in the 19th century was a beautiful thing, but it also opened the gates to a deluge of medical scams and quackery. If you were lucky, they were harmless scams. But more often than not, treatments included addictive and life threatening ingredients. Today, we’re diving into a brief compendium…

When Americans Lived in Tree Stumps

There are trees, and then there are trees out west. “Ancient sequoias,” “Mammoths,” or “Big Trees,” as John Muir liked to say – the nicknames varied, but the trees’ contribution the grandeur of the storied West Coast remained the same. Pioneers worked, breathed, and seriously lived in the darn things. Improbable today, but common in…

Lessons in Historical Male Peacocking, from Lord Gaga to the King of Afrofuturism

They’re performers. Dandies. Men with a streak of the mad poet. Writers, dancers, and professional party boys. Though these eccentrics span across generations, all share a brazen commitment to being themselves that’s made for some of the most memorable menswear moments in the 19th and 20th centuries. Long before fashion was giving the middle finger…

Adored by Many, but Loved by Chanel: A Forgotten Parisian It Girl

Proust, turned her into a fictional princess and Ravel turned her into music. Renoir and Toulouse-Lautrec couldn’t stop painting her. Picasso was a confidante, Serge Diaghilev of the Ballets Russes, a best friend, and Coco Chanel – her “soul sister”; possibly her lover too. Belle Epoque Paris bloomed with opulence and a languid, if not…

What was the Deal with Marcel Duchamp and Chess?

It’s a question we asked ourselves recently in a Messy Nessy editorial meeting after finding yet another photograph of the 20th century artist playing chess in some unusual, avant-garde manner. Discovering a person’s hobby can be so deliciously voyeuristic. It’s a window into the way they switch-off from the world, and one made all the…

The Fascinating Daguerrotypes of Victorians Breastfeeding

You know the daguerrotypes. Stiff scenes of Victorian families in too much clothing, expressing about as much enthusiasm for one another as one would have for a lamppost. That’s why we did a double – no, triple – take when we found a small selection of Victorian breastfeeding portraits in the depths of the web.…

The Tale of Hollywood’s Most Curious Career Imposter

Sex sells, and it sells even better with a dash of mystery. For every housewife in mid-century America, the enigmatic charm of Indian performer Korla Pandit was the ticket to getting weak in the knees before the kids came home from school. In the 15 minutes allotted to The Korla Pandit Program, the performer brought…

The Curious Case of Miss Mechanical Venus

The summer of July 1932 brought an unexpected guest to Brussels, Belgium. The city had become its usual, ephemeral playground for the oddities, treasures, and inventions of the Foire du midi annual fair, but this time it was joined by the curious Dr. Spitzner and his posse of wax humans. The production of dissectible, anatomical…

These Sisters will make your Evil Siblings look like Angels

The Mitford sisters were like a train wreck wrapped in a tornado wrapped in a circus fire – you could’t avert your eyes from their lives. The Times’ Ben Macintyre famously caricaturised the women with impressive pithy: “Diana the Fascist, Jessica the Communist, Unity the Hitler-lover; Nancy the Novelist; Deborah the Duchess and Pamela the…

Was Inflatable Furniture Really All that Bad?

As we dream of sipping an ice cold margarita on a floaty pool mattress, far from the stuffiness of our cubicles, a certain nostalgia comes to mind: the age of 1960s, blow up “living.” Through furniture, rooms, even a car, the inflatable life brought a welcome touch of relaxation and sheer goofiness to a design…