Arts & Culture

A champagne toast for all leads into a gourmet meal.

Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: Paris

Eat Like a Parisian in a Parisian Apartment

An Internet-based service allows visitors an authentic taste of food, friendship and culture

Industrial designer Shin Kuo thinks everyone in a building should be able to live in the penthouse for a time.

Six Architectural Ideas That Could Change the Way We Live in Cities

Whether in response to polluted air or shrinking space, architects keep coming up with novel approaches to reshaping urban life

At the Mbad African Bead Museum in Detroit, Obscura Day visitors can see beads almost 400 years old.

Urban Explorations

This Obscura Day, Discover the Curiosities in Your Own Backyard

Creepy dolls, KGB secrets and unexpected pinball troves—media startup Atlas Obscura invites readers to explore their own hometowns on May 30

Native Dress Calgary Stampede(2010)

Scenes From the Calgary Stampede

Noted photographer Richard Phibbs has a new book that sends him back home on the range

The World's Largest Picture Frame?

The government of Dubai is taking this abstract structure to the next level

More than 3,000 lights adorned Ferris' wheel.

The Brief History of the Ferris Wheel

Originally the American answer to the Eiffel Tower, the summertime amusement became a hallmark of summer fun

Still from Coca-Cola advertisement

American History Museum Scholar on the History of the "I'd Like to Buy the World a Coke" Advertisement

The commercial that closed out the series finale of "Mad Men," explained

Watch As a Real-Life Hoverboard Whirs to Life

At Smithsonian magazine's Future is Here festival, a few lucky attendees got to take a ride

Meet the Prize-Winning Spiders From the British Tarantula Society's Annual Competition

Now in its 30th year, the arachnid-equivalent of the Westminster Dog Show showcases the strange beauty of an eight-legged obsession

A skull at Bolivia's Fiesta de las Ñatitas.

New Photo Book Explores Places the Dead Don’t Rest

From mossy burial caves to bone-filled churches, photographer Paul Koudounaris spent a dozen years documenting sites where the living and dead interact

How Food Truck Parks Are Making America More Like Southeast Asia

Pushing for nutritious options, as public officials in Singapore are doing, could boost the health of cities and their residents

Yasuo Kuniyoshi, in his New York City Studio in 1940, is at work on the painting Upside Down Table and Mask, currently on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Meet the Iconic Japanese-American Artist Whose Work Hasn't Been Exhibited in Decades

A reexamination of the inventive artist, who blended American and Japanese traditions, brings rarely seen works from around the world to the Smithsonian

Swedish designer Sighten Harrgard and his fiancee model a unisex belted jacket and scarf with wide-legged double-knit trousers—March 1969.

How His'n'Her Ponchos Became A Thing: A History Of Unisex Fashion

"Unisex" was rarely used before the fashion trend hit it big in the late 1960s

Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: Paris

Haute Stuff: Nine Unique Gifts to Buy in Paris

Leave room in your suitcase for these irresistible items made by French artisans

Umami Concepts, a fully stocked kitchen in Hong Kong, can be rented for an evening.

For Your Next Party, Rent a Kitchen the Size of Your Apartment

With living space shrinking, urbanites are paying for kitchen space to host special occasions

A display of Jim Beam bourbons at a Kentucky distillery.

What Makes Bourbon Uniquely American?

A new book examines everything that makes the spirit special to the United States

The glamorous actress in the 1940s.

How Katharine Hepburn Became a Fashion Icon

Celebrate the Hollywood star with a look at her stellar costumes

A pelican dives for dinner among an unsuspecting school of fish.

Paper Turtles and Frisky Skates Bring This Indoor Seashore to Life

A new exhibit at the National Aquarium in Baltimore takes visitors on a trip to the beach and into the dark depths of the Atlantic

In Camille Utterback's 1999 Text Rain, viewers become part of the artwork.

In this Exhibition You Can Play with the Artworks, Or Even Be the Art

A dizzying array of wildly unorthodox works from video games to computer codes makes up this summer's blockbuster "Watch This!" show

Anna Jarvis, a woman who championed the establishment of Mother's Day.

The Tenacious Woman Who Helped Keep Mother’s Day Alive

For Anna Jarvis, a holiday devoted to moms was not sentimental fluff, but a practical exercise in patriotism

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