Places Vivian Shen Wants to Go

For the last eight decades, this curious shop has been ridding Atlanta of bad juju.

One of the world’s largest collections of paper memorabilia chronicles 4,000 years of papermaking.

Where scientists keep miles of very valuable ice from Antarctica and Greenland from melting.

Where else would a linchpin of post-colonial Native American cuisine anchor the menu but a museum?

Spanning an elevation of 160 feet and containing 388 steps, this is Seattle's longest staircase.

This historic building provides a powerful glimpse into the lives of Japanese Americans forced to relocate during World War II.

The tech giant built three enormous glass orbs in Seattle so employees could work inside a rainforest greenhouse.

This Seattle joint serves food inside an old train car once used by FDR.

On East Burnside, a 24-hour vending machine distributes world-class pastries.

The world's only international cryptozoology museum is host to an unrivaled collection of mysterious objects.

A collection of huge, site-specific sculptures sitting in the Montana woods.

Partially submerged Buddha heads freckle Chicago’s neighborhoods.

Over 1,000 pieces of one of the most niche art objects imaginable: the glass paperweight.

A curious collection of miniatures in a quiet corner of the Chicago Children's Museum.

Assemble a masterpiece at the first and only North American school exclusively dedicated to mosaic art.

An avant garde art museum at the University of Chicago.

Each of these gorgeous, intricately decorated rooms is painstakingly crafted to the scale of 1 inch: 1 foot.

At Chicago's revered Field Museum, visitors are invited to learn about and literally explore DNA.

The world's only known button museum.

This museum celebrating the almighty dollar lets visitors literally stand in the shadow of a million bucks.

A shining sculpture made of 3,115 lights, the number of visible stars in the Northern Hemisphere.

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

These abandoned grain silos and tunnels are an urban exploration dream.

Nonprofit art center that promotes outsider, intuitive, and self-taught art.