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Manerba del Garda, Italy
Pontile di San Sivino
Beneath the swimmers at San Sivino lies an entire Bronze Age village, submerged for over 3,000 years.
From the CommunityBlue
Blue has been an important color since ancient times. Often associated with peace and harmony, explore our collection for calm vibes.
Broadstairs, United Kingdom
Viking Bay Beach
A beach renamed in 1949 for 53 Danes, a replica longship, and a very good publicity stunt.
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Kazan, Russia
Kul Sharif Mosque
Kazan's Kul Sharif Mosque was destroyed in 1552 and rebuilt 450 years later, opening in 2005 for the city's millennium.
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Penzance, United Kingdom
The Old Lifeboat House
Cornwall's first lifeboat station moved four times before 1884, when a £1,000 donation built a granite home for just £575.
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Penzance, United Kingdom
Jubilee Pool
One councillor called it "the biggest white elephant Penzance has ever had." He was spectacularly wrong.
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Tresigallo, Italy
SOGNI Building
A restoration changed one letter on this 1930s fascist bathhouse, from BAGNI to SOGNI, accidentally turning baths into dreams.
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Kazan, Russia
Galiev Mosque
Forced into exile in 1552, Kazan's Tatars built their own 'Atlantis': a quarter of mosques and merchant mansions by Lake Kaban.
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Portsmouth, United Kingdom
Portsmouth Kite Festival
A Chinese general measured enemy walls with kites in 200 B.C. Now international teams perform synchronized routines over the Solent.
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Borgholm, Sweden
Kallbadhuset Borgholm
Borgholm's cold-water bathhouse has been destroyed twice, rebuilt three times, and refuses to stay dead.
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Marseille, France
Pavillon de la Girafe
A diplomatic giraffe walked 550 miles across France in 1827, sparking 'giraffomania' that drew 600,000 visitors.
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Cape Town, South Africa
Muizenberg Beach Huts
Muizenberg's bathing boxes started as Victorian modesty machines on wheels, then lost their wheels when mixed bathing became legal in 1901.
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Marbella, Spain
Marbella
A breakdown in a 900-person fishing village: how Prince Alfonso de Hohenlohe's faulty Rolls-Royce accidentally created Marbella.
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Nice, France
Cathédrale Saint-Nicolas de Nice
Built for Russian aristocrats fleeing winter, this cathedral's patron—Tsar Nicholas II—never saw the revolution coming.
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New York, New York, United States
Wise Clock
After a century-long journey from Boston to Brooklyn, a brief retreat to Pennsylvania, and finally to a beach in Queens, this elegant sentinel still keeps time for the passing tide.
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Historical Centre, Brazil
Praça Marechal Deodoro (Praça da Matriz)
Porto Alegre's main square started as a graveyard in 1753, later imported 20 Portuguese olive trees, and became a skateboard park.
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London, United Kingdom
Elaine’s London
London's Elaine's channels the spirit of NYC's legendary writers' hangout, closed since 2011 after 48 years of celebrity chaos.
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Goczałkowice-Zdrój, Poland
Chapel of Our Lady, Healer of the Sick
A mother built this chapel in 1866 to thank Mary for healing her son, then painted him directly into the altarpiece as proof.
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Kutaisi, Georgia
Great Synagogue
A Soviet auto plant reporter translated Georgia's national epic into Hebrew: now a monument honors him outside this 1886 synagogue.
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Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Duncan Mclaren Locksmiths
Founded in 1851—the year a locksmith picked Britain's 'unpickable' lock at the Great Exhibition—this shop still cuts keys.
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Ericeira, Portugal
Ericeira
One of two European surfing reserve draws wave-chasers, but vintage Land Rover devotees come for Portugal's dirt roads.
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Istanbul, Turkey
Fenerbahçe Chobani Stadium
Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II leased Turkey's first football pitch for 30 gold pounds in 1908. Rivals once shared the field.
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Kythira, Greece
Kythira
Kythira, mythical birthplace of Aphrodite, now has more descendants in Australia than residents on the island itself.
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Kashan, Iran
Sultan Amir Ahmad Bathhouse
This 16th-century bathhouse has winding corridors designed to protect bathers from dangerous temperature shocks between rooms.
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Marseille, France
Cathédrale de la Major
France's only 19th-century cathedral took 40 years to build and matches St. Peter's Basilica in scale: all to impress sailors.
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Binz, Germany
Trauort Badekarren am Strand
A Victorian bathing machine that once hid swimmers now hosts weddings in 4.25 square meters on a German beach.
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60 Landskrona, Sweden
Lill-Olas Badstrand
This Swedish beach has an elevator into the sea and a separate shoreline reserved entirely for dogs.
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Buffalo, New York, United States
Richardson Hotel
Originally an insane asylum, with grounds designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, this historic building is now a hotel and urban center.
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Seoul, South Korea
Banpo Hangang Park
Where instant noodles taste better, according to an entire city.
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Co. Cork, Ireland
Dursey Island Cable Car
Europe's only cable car crossing open sea once transported livestock: cows and sheep dangled above the Atlantic until 2012.
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Kyiv, Ukraine
Mariinsky Palace
Built for an empress who never visited, destroyed twice by fire and bombs—yet nothing of the original 1752 palace remains.
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Granard, Ireland
Granard Farmers Mart
This farmer-owned mart has weathered every crisis since 1970, selling over 25,000 cattle yearly on the same Monday-Wednesday schedule.
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Ogland, Kazakhstan
Beket Ata Underground Mosque
This 18th-century underground mosque carved into desert rock may have doubled as an astronomical observatory.
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Hjørring, Denmark
Rubjerg Knude Lighthouse
A museum about sand drift, defeated by sand drift.
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Tabriz, Iran
Qajar Museum
This diplomat's mansion nearly became a school parking lot before a 13-year rescue transformed it into Tabriz's Qajar Museum.
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Dublin, Ireland
Polaris Building, Dublin City University
DCU's Polaris Building corralled 3,000 students from four scattered buildings into one €80 million facility during a pandemic.
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