The Secret NYC Art Gallery in a Forgotten Subway Station

Only a few people in the world will ever get to say they’ve seen this place and its artworks… In 2009 the Underbelly Project project began four stories underneath the skin of New York. For 100 years, a massive subway station sat unfinished, unused, undiscovered. Over the course of a year, artists were secretly escorted…

The Lost Art of the Cutaway

I could say, that as a kid, I used to love looking at cutaway illustrations, but the thing is: I still think they’re just the greatest thing ever. With cutaway art, you get to examine and explore miniature hidden worlds behind-the-scenes and under an x-ray. The best stuff surely came out of the mid twentieth…

Three Cities, Three Nocturnal Cultures

Europe is hardly a nocturnal place. Most cities seem to close up shop and tuck into bed by 10pm, unlike New York, where you can buy anything at any hour. But three different photographers, in three different European cities took to the streets to document the stand alone trades that operate after dark. These are…

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

1. An Upcycled Wine Barrel Coopered cabin near Luleå, Sweden. It’s made from a barrel once used to carry wine on a ship many years ago. Found on Cabin P0rn 2. Rarely seen photographs of Marilyn Monroe Photographed in May 1957 in Amagansett, Long Island by Sam Shaw. Found here. 3. Handmade Vintage Globes…

Lost Paris: Documenting the Disappearance of a Medieval City

If you can’t make it to Paris (or time travel), the next best thing might just be these photographs of a Paris lost, moments before its disappearance. Before it became the city of light, before the Eiffel Tower became its unmistakable symbol, photographer Charles Marville was commissioned to document the transition from medieval Paris, a city that…

Why Doesn’t Food Packaging look like this Anymore?

I‘ll let you in on a little secret. Backstage at Messy Nessy Chic, we’re in the early stages of a website re-design; an image overhaul, a shiny new make-over! And of course when it comes to any kind of re-decorating, you need inspiration. On the look-out for beautiful typography, colour palettes and shapes, I came…

Here is the Instagram Account of a Photojournalist stationed in North Korea

David Guttenfelder might just be the most interesting person to follow on Instagram. As the Associated Press Chief photographer in Asia, he’s a bit of a regular in North Korea now that the AP has opened a bureau in Pyongyang. “I’ve covered stories where foreign photographers are everywhere. But in North Korea I’m usually the…

Shoefiti: Behind the Modern Mystery of Shoe Tossing

Have you ever seen a pair of sneakers tied together and hanging over a power line? Chances are you have. The practice of shoe flinging, nicknamed ‘shoefiti’, is widespread and can be found the world over, from busy city streets to the loneliest desert highways. But for such a worldwide phenomenon, the strangest thing of…

The Luxury Hotel with a Secret Cold War Bunker built for Congress

For thirty years, a luxury resort hotel in West Virginia played host to the world’s wealthiest holidaymakers, all the while covertly moonlighting as the secret underground bunker built to house the United States government in the event of a nuclear fallout… In preparation for a nuclear attack, every last member of the legislative branch would…

To the Bookmobile! The Library on Wheels of Yesteryear

Long before Amazon was bringing books to your doorstep, there was the Bookmobile! A travelling library often used to provide books to villages and city suburbs that had no library buildings, the bookmobile went from a simple horse-drawn cart in the 19th century to large customised vehicles that became part of American culture and reached…