1. Springtime Autochromes, 1900s Found on ..read more

Fancy living in your very own Rapunzel tower less than an hour’s drive from Paris? Our Rapunzel in this case was Anne Boleyn – the first of Henry VIII’s wives to be beheaded – who lived here in her formative years. It used to be much bigger mind you. The 14th century keep is all that’s left of a moated castle that fell to ruin ..read more

© Laura Young We often have a romantic notion of what it might be like to walk into a thrift store and walk out with treasure. But in reality, what happens next can be a roller coaster ride that changes your life forever. In 2018, antiques dealer Laura Young discovered an ancient Roman bust in an Austin Goodwill store and took it home for $35. You might have seen the story when it went viral on the internet ..read more

 1. Ron’s Place: England’s secret Outsider Art palace Behind the facade of this unassuming Victorian villa in the heart of Birkenhead, Merseyside, lies a hidden treasure trove of creativity and passion that was hidden for decades. This is Ron’s Place, a conventional flat transformed by  ..read more

Django Reinhardt was a legendary jazz musician and considered by some the greatest guitarist who ever lived, even more so when you find out he did it all with two fingers. He began as a nomadic busker before becoming a virtuoso and then a romanticised Parisian sepia memory, who still calls out in rolling arpeggios from the grooves of a crackling wax disc. A Romani nomad who would overcome great adversity in life to astound audiences with his genius and technique, he would influence all that would come after him with woven melodies that danced and sang from his fingertips. He would travel a mu ..read more

1. Rococo and Baroque Pools From a comment: “In 1629, in the Farnese theater in Parma, they did a Naumachia with sea monsters and naval battles, and for this purpose, the large and extraordinary scenic apparatus was used, flooding the stalls duly waterproofed with the waters of the Farnesian aqueduct conveyed into tanks under the stage and drained into the stalls thanks to the ingenious hydraulic system. So you’ve imagined something in Italy was real in the 1600s ..read more

What do you mean you’ve never heard of the lost civilization of Great Tartaria? It’s only one of the weirdest architectural conspiracy theories going. It seems there has been a monumental cover-up to hide the truth from us all about an ancient empire that’s hiding in plain sight all around us – or so a fast-growing group of pseudo internet historians would have us believe. A kingdom so vast and architecturally sophisticated as to rival even the Roman empire, many of the world’s most famous architectural landmarks across the world are claimed to represent remnants of this lost empire ..read more

The sex industry was one of 18th century Britain’s most lucrative enterprises, and the women and girls at the centre of this trade enraptured the nation, endlessly feeding society with tantalising tales from behind closed doors. But all too often, their voices have been left down the back of history’s sofa, largely due to the powerful men who preferred their own seedy practices to remain hidden from record. So let’s shift the spotlight. With a flair for the dramatic and a penchant for turning heads, Kitty Fisher wasn’t just the talk of the town in Georgian London, she was its undisputed ..read more

1. Abkhazia, the Lost Paradise by Pierpaolo Mittica Abkhazia is a non-place. However, it was once considered a paradise. In the years of the Soviet Union, this strip of land spanning 200 kilometres by 100 and facing onto the Black Sea was the chosen holiday destination of the political elite, who could enjoy hospitality of the highest standards ..read more

© ..read more