Love, Espionage and Alien Vibrations: Tales of a Soviet Music Machine

What do Lady Gaga and Lenin have in common? They’ve both played the theremin– the world’s first mass-produced electrical instrument, invented by the same guy who created a covert Soviet listening device that sat undetected for 7 years inside the American Embassy in Moscow (planted by Russian school children, no less). The extraordinary story of…

Get to Know the Woman behind these Real-Life Wes Anderson Interiors

Like it or not, we’re living in a Wes Anderson world; from fashion trends to instagram fads to interiors, the director’s aesthetic has well and truly taken over. And if you want to make it your business to know the names of the movers & shakers behind our current generation’s design movement, you should probably…

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

1. Secrets of the Holland Island Bar Light The Holland Island Bar Light was a screw-pile lighthouse in the Chesapeake Bay which existed from 1889 to 1960. It is remembered for the unexplained death of one of its keepers, and for being “attacked” by United States Navy pilots during a training exercise. Read about rum runners, rockets and (maybe) bloody murder on the…

Reviving the Real-Life “Middle Earth” Maps in a Secret Paris Museum

Maps and Miniatures — these are a few of my favourite things (along with Paris and all its secret places, of course). But you might be wondering what secrets I could possibly find at one of the most recognisable landmarks in Paris, Les Invalides? So big you can’t miss it, built four centuries ago for the invalids…

Stargazing for Aliens, not Celebrities, on the French Riviera

As it turns out, the French Riviera caters to more than a few of our favourite holiday past-times: channeling Brigitte Bardot, building sand castles at the beach and … tracking down aliens? About an hour north of the seaside city of Nice, into the mountainous terrain where Provence meets the Cote d’Azur; at the end of a…

A Beginner’s Guide to the Bath Houses of Japan

You’re probably familiar with the favourite Roman past time of nude public bathing, but did you know that it’s an even bigger phenomenon in Japan? Getting hot and steamy is deeply rooted in the Japanese culture, and public baths are still as popular as ever. The archipelago, which consists of over 6, 800 islands, is…

Backstage with the Real “Almost Famous” Queen of Groupies

If someone told you their earliest romantic encounters were with David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Mick Jagger, you’d either slap them or roll your eyes. Unless that someone was Bebe Buell, of course. In the 1970s, the American model just so happened to be in the right place, at the right time, well, countless times, solidifying…

There’s an Alternate Universe of Pre-MTV Music Videos You’ve Never Seen

The birth of the music video is often credited to MTV. It was 1981 when the first 24-hour music channel launched on our screens with “Video Killed the Radio Star”. Oh the irony, right? Wrong. Video and the radio star actually go way back. Get comfortable, because we’re about to have some fun getting to…

Inside Central Park’s 140 Year-old Marionette Theatre

“I spent some time as Peter Pan’s shadow” is the kind of sentence that’d only make sense here, at the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theater in Central Park. This 143-year-old wooden chalet was plucked from Swedish soil, and rebuilt smack in the heart of Manhattan in 1877. Since then it’s had many lives, but none as…

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

1. Shadowboxes Visually immersive handmade models, as alluring and enchanting as they are curious. Visit the Etsy shop here. 2. Just Bill Murray taking a nap on the set of Fantastic Mr. Fox Found via Syndicated Cinema’s Instagram account. 3. Scenes in a Bottle Forget ships in a bottle… The “Picasso”, if you…