Places laurasmith Wants to Go

An abandoned jewel of a ballroom on the top floor of Australia’s busiest rail station echoes with the sounds of a bygone era.

This hidden labyrinth offers walkers some brief peace of mind.

This tiny, painted door at the base of a tree stump has been a fixture of the Harvard University campus for decades.

An often-shuddersome journey into a low-tech, robotic themepark.

High atop the Eiffel Tower is a small apartment built exclusively to entertain the science elite and make the rest of Paris jealous.

Miles of man-made caves and tunnels are currently used for cultivating mushrooms.

A beautiful and classically designed villa, with an hourly infestation of monsters.

Come for the pastrami, stay for the million-dollar art.

“Invented in Key West, Perfected in Brooklyn."

This former Norwegian sailor's church is slowly being taken over by ramshackle robot musicians.

One of New York's best collections of pinball is hidden in a secret bar in the back of this laundromat.

Love, knishes, and best wishes from this legendary Lower East Side bakery.

This little museum is built on a theater that was once a wildly elaborate speakeasy.

The one-stop shop for all of your superhero (or evil arch-nemesis) needs.

Two community gardens under the elevated subway lines on a very busy commercial strip in Bushwick.

A terrific purveyor of natural history objects and curios.

Known as the "Forgotten City" it was home to industry, riots, artists, squatters, and to one of the largest single disaster fires in New York City.

A no-frills cinephile haven known for showing offbeat, underseen films.

Check out the underground party scene at the "Burning Man of Brooklyn."

Haven for steampunks.

Self-sufficient greenhouse floating on the Hudson River.

The return of something once considered a basic part of life.

Two New York rooftops are home to the largest rooftop soil farms in the world.

A massive art collective tries a new take on Brooklyn's DIY music scene—by making it fully legal.