Places Edited by Eric Grundhauser

This Tennessee manse was built so opulent that the very utilities doomed it to fail.

Crammed into a Baltimore row house is an oddities shop that sells everything from skulls to dead insects.

The world's only museum devoted to the wonders of fluorescence.

An art world insider finds himself battling for his artistic home.

While he no longer has an eatery to give him context, this off-brand Paul Bunyan still holds his giant hot dog with pride.

The remains of a paranoid inventor's hidden workshop lie in beautiful ruins amidst a Canadian park.

The world's longest outdoor escalator takes visitors to the top of China's largest dam and is also shaped like a dragon.

Today this bizarre rooftop phone booth seems like a piece of kitsch but it was once used to spot disastrous storms.

This picturesque cliffside beacon no longer calls to sailors but shines once a year in honor of a famous shipwreck.

The culture that built these Tanzanian ruins displayed advanced knowledge of irrigation technology before mysteriously disappearing.

This tumultuous Icelandic lava field looks so alien European researchers want to use it as a stand-in for Mars.

This Swedish automobile graveyard is a beautiful gallery of decay, but woe be to any who would steal a souvenir.

This small group of sand dunes manages to pack in a strange rainbow of colors.

Nestled on the banks of a river in Nuremberg is a small museum that was once home of the city's official executioner.

The life of one of FDR's possible mistresses is preserved in her palatial Hudson Valley mansion.

Thirteen sculptures in central Moscow graphically depicting vices of the modern world.

Legend says these rocks used to be hunting dogs, a story that may have inspired Sherlock Holmes' most famous case.

The final remnant of the Arkansas zinc industry is this historically protected ghost town.

Chicago's museum dedicated to the history of bondage and fetishism is more textbook than titillation.

This stunning gothic ruin was a casualty of the Indiana steel industry crash.

This tiny square mile of Canadian sand was once considered the world's smallest desert.

These WWII-era murals were initially booed as a libelous portrayal of the American dream but have survived multiple attempts to have them destroyed.

Catholics make up 84% of Ireland's population but this Dublin museum remembers the small but important Jewish community.

This museum dedicated to an oft-overlooked support industry features a surprisingly moving brass diorama of a man being saved from a sinking car.