This 1,300 year old monastery built atop a single rock was once only accessible depending on the whims of the tide.

An abandoned beach resort in Normandy reclaimed by artists.

A self-built mosaic house and sculpture park.

Huge Russian Orthodox cemetery in danger of being converted into open public space.

18th century underground pilgrimage site, dedicated to a Saint that did something...

The artist and his brother are buried in a landscape straight out of a van Gogh painting.

Abandoned railway line circling the city of Paris.

The vast, legendary catacombs hold secrets much stranger than stacked bones.

A scandalous Art Nouveau collaboration that set Paris all atwitter at the turn of the 20th century.

A popular shrine where the Blessed Virgin allegedly appeared in 1830, displaying a holy armchair and two incorruptible remains of Lady Saints.

Natural history museum celebrating biodiversity with a parade of taxidermy animals.

A haunting collection of the vanished and disappearing natural world.

A majestic lion statue guards this Parisian botanical garden, and feeds on an unsettling item.

Hidden away in a modern library are the remains of one of the 18th century's most celebrated wunderkammers.

This museum houses an imposing skeleton army comprised of creatures great and small.

This life-size replica of the Statue of Liberty's flame is also a tribute to Princess Diana by default.

Known as the "Dodo Manège," this carousel features a herd of animals that have disappeared—or may be gone soon.

Statue of death tucked in the University of Medicine courtyard.

Paris' fabled purveyor of exotic taxidermy and natural history curios.

A surrealist timepiece by the artist of melting clocks.

A counter-culture bookstore like no other hides in plain sight in the streets of Paris.

This iconic Parisian bookstore doubles as the "Tumbleweed Hotel" for traveling writers.

The former home of France's controversial pop maestro is almost completely covered in ever-changing tributes and graffiti.

This bridge was constructed from the rubble of the infamous Bastille.