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Category / Nostalgia

The Paris of Tomorrow That Thankfully Never Was

What do you love most about Paris? Perhaps it’s looking up at all the limestone detail of Haussmann’s grand boulevards or getting lost down a cobblestone street leading to a hidden bucolic courtyard. Those classic grey zinc roofs that provide the perfect reflection for the city’s famed sunsets aren’t bad either. Or maybe it’s just…

The Art of Kissing Fanny

There’s a curious expression used in Provence by pétanque players. “Embrasser Fanny” or to “kiss Fanny”, is a small recompense for making a fool of oneself to put it simply. But where does this mischievous phrase originate from? Fanny was a waitress at a local café in the Savoie region or Lyon– no one seems to agree. Watching the…

Coins of Desire: The Erotic Currency of Parisian Brothels

Not all antiques clink with noble history. Some carry a more risqué past, whispering of velvet curtains, candlelit parlors, and the secret economies of Paris by night. Among them are the curious “jetons de maison close” (brothel tokens) — currency that look at first like ordinary coins, stamped with imperial profiles or decorative motifs, but…

Unrecognizable Paris: The Monuments that Vanished

What you are looking at is not Disneyland Paris. These are photographs colored by hand (a popular practice at the turn of the 20th century) of the Exposition Universelle in 1900 in Paris. It was the fifth one to take place in the city and centered mainly on the revolutionary achievements in electrical technology at…

What’s Up with all the Lady Parts in Medieval Prayer Books?

Let’s say you’re flipping through a medieval Christian prayer book (as you do), and suddenly you come across a curious illustration amongst the prayers and psalms of something that looks unmistakably like female genitalia. A scolding voice in your head tells you to get your mind out of the gutter. But you wouldn’t be alone.…

The Not-So-Lost World of the Parisian Salon

Once upon a time, in a pre-smartphone world, people had to make their own entertainment. And so enters the salon, an Italian-influenced tradition of gathering of artists, writers, musicians, dancers, philosophers and intelligencia that flourished during a period known as the ‘age of conversation’. Dating back to the 17th century, guests would assemble in the…

Trolling Nazis (and the world) with Forged Art

The accepted number of authenticated Vermeer paintings today is 34, but that number became mysteriously higher during World War II. Hermann Göring himself, a leader of the Nazi party and notorious art looter, traded 137 of his prized stolen paintings for a newly-discovered Vermeer, one of several 17th century works that had suddenly emerged in…

The Time Capsule Ghost Town waiting to be brought Back to Life

On the north coast of British Columbia in Canada, where the Alaskan border is closer than the nearest town, lies a mysterious hidden place, accessible only by a long arduous gravel road behind a locked gate. Ninety-four homes, two hundred apartments, a hospital, shopping mall, Town & Country restaurant, movie theatre, sports centre, a Royal…

Found Snapshots of a Secret 1960s Drag Resort in the Catskills

If you were to journey to Jewett, NY today, you would find yet another semi-abandoned white hamlet, deep in the hillside, ramshackle and in need of a facelift. Nothing out of the ordinary to the naked eye, but delve further into this particular dwelling’s history and you’ll discover that it was here, almost 60 years…
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Mum & Dad named me Vanessa, but you can call me Nessy.

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