I learned of the work of New York artist Katherine Mangiardi from the Merchant’s House Museum of all places. So appropriate. Mangiardi’s paintings of lace are unbelievably haunting, like the delicate, filmy fabric of a ghost, or like the painfully decaying lace of an antique dress. I also found her fabric installations at various historic museums around the East Coast rather beautiful. I find the idea of being able to set up an installation in a historic house pretty intriguing.

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Cornwall, England is considered a great weekend getaway for the over-worked under-played Londonite. So much to do! Hiking, horseback riding, castle touring, country pubbing, garden tours and my favourite, surfing! For those of you who find these past-times a bit prosaic and cliched, this little Cornish beach town is also home to the Museum of Witchcraft where the Richel Collection is on exhibit, the world’s best collection of ritual and sex magic artifacts. Dutch collector Bob Richel inherited the collection from his father-in-law, Mr Eldermans, who had been a Magister of the Ars Amatoria, a group using sex magic. Now, there is a dowry I’ve yet to hear of! It gives a whole new meaning to the The Red Hot Chili Peppers song Blood, Sugar, Sex, Magic.

Zaha Hadid has been announced as the winning architect for the Guggenheim Hermitage Museum, Vilnius, Lithuania. As with the rest of the Guggenheim Museums, the architectural boundaries are pushed. Zaha lets loose with her fluid, energetic architecture and has subsequently deemed the building to be the manifestation of the city’s new cultural significance. One wonders which is the next city that requires a Guggenheim shot in the arm?

The Virtual Shoe Museum was initiated by Liza Snook in 2004. Once the idea was born, a long search began for designers, photographers and publishers connected to shoes. New friendships developed and their mailbox filled with loads of material on fantastic shoes, art and design on shoes. The Shoe featured above is the Electric Light Shoe by Strawberry Frog.

I’d never before seen a museum where the building itself is the attraction more so than what is exhibited inside. Built by Daniel Libeskind in 1999, the Jewish Museum in Berlin is worth a visit even if you are not an architecture fan. The whole building was designed around Jewish history in Germany from the 4th Century to the present. It’s beautiful architecture, but what’s most striking is the concept behind the design. The line to get in may be long, but when you’re in Berlin, do not miss it.

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