Museum of espionage, broken hearts… Do you know the most unusual museums in the world?

In New York or Paris, let’s forget the MET and the Louvre for a moment. Let’s replace them with the Morgan Library & Museum or the Museum of Hunting and Nature. It is at the top of the grand staircase of this Parisian mansion, located in the Marais, that we find Patrick Baud. “Here is one of the addresses that I mention: more confidential and less renowned than other places, but which houses remarkable works», explains the author of the book Curious museums. Here, as a bonus, no endless queues, nor dense crowds in front of their paintings by Pierre Paul Rubens or Alexandre-François Desportes.

This place features in his 250-page book, published this fall, which highlights atypical collections from around the world. “I noticed that no book listed the most unusual museums on a global scale. So I took up the challenge of unearthing these nuggetss,” the writer tells Figaroafter spending more than a year conducting extensive research.

Highlighting little-known places

Beyond the “unusual” label, three criteria guided the author in establishing his selection: “The place had to be unknown to the general public, its visual aspect had to appeal and arouse curiosity, and it had to contain a captivating story or anecdotes to tell.», he explains. In addition to his personal knowledge, he contacted tourist offices in various countries to refine his selection of these “cabinets of curiosities”, as he calls them.

«They also had to be human-sized», specifies Patrick Baud, driven by the desire to avoid the phenomenon of “Museum fatigue”. This term refers to the exhaustion caused by visiting exhibitions that are too large, where the accumulation of objects ends up saturating the mind. “My goal is the opposite: I want to surprise on every page“, he declares enthusiastically.

Soap Museum in Poland, a set of funeral carriages in Spain, majestic fans in Great Britain… Every passion has its own secret refuge. Although the author explored a large number of these places, he did not visit them all: “This would have been impossible, but I plan to check out several of them in the future.» His favorite? “The one on the cover: the Initium et Finis museum, located in Germany. This totally unknown place is nestled in a small village. Its creator was moved to appear on the first page, he couldn’t believe that a Frenchman was interested in his property“, he confides.

In addition to the collections themselves, Patrick Baud also wishes to promote areas little frequented by tourists, such as Estonia or the town of Gruyères, in Switzerland. Several places mentioned in the book don’t even have a website… Enough to make the experience even more local, in order to discover a region that goes against the grain of tourist habits.

The most original

Underwater Sculpture Museum, Ayia Napa (Cyprus)

More than 93 submerged sculptures can be admired… provided you know how to dive! With its appearance of the kingdom of Atlantis, MUSAN, located off Pernera Beach in Cyprus, brings together works by British artist Jason deCaires Taylor, designed in pH-neutral materials to preserve marine fauna. These creations aim to raise awareness about the protection of the environment and the oceans.

Museum of Broken Hearts, Zagreb (Croatia)

What do two Croatian artists do after a separation? They create a museum of broken hearts. Opened in 2006 in Zagreb, this place brings together objects linked to romantic breakups, such as a garden gnome, thrown on the windshield of an ex-husband on the day of the divorce. Each relic is accompanied by a text, immersing the visitor in the tragic – or sometimes comical – stories of ended relationships.

World’s largest collection of the world’s smallest versions of the world’s largest things (The world’s largest collection of the world’s smallest versions of the biggest things) (Lucas, United States)

This concept with an endless name is based on the work of the artist Erika Nelson, a specialist in monumental works. She photographs giant, emblematic objects found in different public places in the United States (milk bottle, ball of yarn, etc.), then reproduces them in miniature versions which she exhibits in this extraordinary place in Kansas.

The Abode of Chaos, Saint-Romain-au-Mont-d’Or (France)

North of Lyon, the small town of Saint-Romain-au-Mont-d’Or hides a singular secret: an old building, formerly a Protestant temple, transformed in 1999 into a contemporary art museum by Thierry Ehrmann, its owner. Free of charge, you can discover 6,300 works of art in an open-air tour extending over 9,000 square meters.

ON VIDEO – Asterix and Obelix enter the Grévin Museum for their birthday.