International Obscura Day Returns May 2015!
Save the Date: May 30th marks the return of International Obscura Day!Obscura Day is the real-world manifestation of Atlas Obscura - a day of expeditions, back-room tours, unusual access and discovery...
View ArticleThe Most Remarkable Globe in The World Is in a Brooklyn Office Building
Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart's signatures on The Fliers and Explorers Globe (Photo by Luke Spencer)On the second floor of a nondescript office building in downtown Brooklyn, behind a plain...
View ArticleISIS and Iconoclasm: The History of the Museum Smash
Visiting the Baghdad Museum website is now a journey into a black screen that reads, simply: This statement is quite literal. Recent weeks have been painful for anyone with even a passing interest in...
View ArticleThe United Islands of America: Rest Ashored
“Hair Apparent” hair salons. “Legal Grounds” coffee shops. “Dew Drop Inn” motels. America’s business owners can’t seem to resist a good pun. The same goes for vacation homes; a house at the beach...
View ArticleWay Off The Grid: 6 Earthships That You Should Know
The EVE Project Earthship in Taos (photo by Sarah Richter / Flickr)It's perhaps not surprising that a structure called "Earthship" has been around since the '70s—and that, like similarly vintaged...
View ArticleAccidental Encounters With A Badass 8th Century Buddhist Mystic
A Bhutanese guide peeks into the main shrine room of the Chagri Monastery, about 10 miles north of Thimphu, Bhutan. Chagri is one of many places where, according to legend, Guru Rinpoche subjugated...
View ArticleInto the Jaws of Doors: The Open-Wide World of 11 Mouth-Shaped Portals
The screaming face of Goh Gajah. (Photo: mastahanky on Flickr)Have you ever looked at the face of another person and thought, "Man. I wish I could walk into their mouth." Well judging by the abundance...
View ArticleInside The Most Amazing Map Library That You've Never Heard Of
The American Geographical Society Library at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. (Photo: Luke Spencer.)Within the campus of University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is a geographer’s treasure trove: over...
View ArticleBehind the Music: 6 Iconic Locations From Classic Album Art
Missing: one giant pig. (Photo: Atlas Obscura) As music becomes an almost exclusively digital commodity, the days of indelibly iconic album art may be a thing of the past. Yet the look of some record...
View Article7 Wildlife Sanctuaries Where You Can Get Incredibly Close To Animals
Sloth friends at Aviarios del Caribe in Costa Rica. (Photo: Jenny Jozwiak on Flickr). Once you've been to an animal sanctuary, it's hard to go back to zoos. These conservation centers do away with...
View ArticleWall Street's Bull Statue Was Once Like Edward Snowden's Sculpture: Totally...
Wall Street's once-illicit bull. (Photo: htmvalerio/Flicker.)Early on Monday morning, a handful of people snuck into Brooklyn’s Fort Greene Park to attach a bust of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to...
View ArticleYou've Had a Good Run, Nature: 8 Amazing Arbors Created by Human Hands
The Singing Ringing Tree (Photo: Matthew Hartley on Flickr)Arbor Day is coming up again on April 24th, but, let's be honest, the wonder of Mother Nature's trees have had the spotlight long enough.For...
View ArticleExploring The Ruins of Pablo Escobar's Secret Island Mansion
(Looking out from the ruins of a cocaine kingpin's vacation home. Photo: Luke Spencer.)About an hour’s sail northwest from the old Spanish port city of Cartagena de Indias are a group of about 30...
View ArticleSexy Beasts: 8 Giant Crazy Machines That Build Our Roads And Railways
Our transportation infrastructure, especially roads and railways, are just about the least sexy elements of modern life that we’re completely reliant on. A peek into how they’re actually constructed,...
View ArticleDown-to-Earth UFOs: 7 Homegrown Spaceships
The Evoluon (Photo: Daniel Volmer on Wikipedia) Logic tells us that UFOs are going to come from another planet, but given that they haven't yet, it seems increasingly unlikely that some space-faring...
View ArticleRooms Full of Wax Legs: The Strange And Moving Tradition of Ex-Voto Offerings
Wooden ex voto and photos that line the walls of the room. (Photo: Sarah Odedina.)The Brazilian city of Salvador has reputably 365 churches, one for each day of the year. All are world heritage...
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