Weekend Conversation Starters

[Messy Nessy Chic]   So how about them UFO’s?! With all these mysterious objects popping up out of nowhere, it’s no surprise that our water cooler chats were devoted to alien invasion contingency plans this week. Sure sure, the White House insists that there’s “no indication” of extraterrestrial activity, but where’s the fun in that? Agreed, [flying saucer conventions were considerably more chic in the 1950s]( but I do have some top secret, out-of-this-world X-files of our own to share with you... Dig into the [declassified files of that time the US Military made flying saucers](. Weird yourself out with [a French Sex Cult from Outer Space]( or pay a visit to [Brooklyn’s Egyptian UFO cult](. Find some otherworldly style inspiration from [URANIUS, undeniably the most fashionable of UFO cults](. Get [a crash course in spaceship living]( with some crazy Finnish architects from the sixties. And have you ever wondered what alien sightings were like before the UFO mania that gripped post-war America? As it happens, the world’s first ufologist made lots of notes of [E.T. sightings from the really old days](. But if you’d like to take a break from little green men, your weekend conversations await. Stay curious, [Nessy]   [America’s Last Juke Joints](  [10085185935_77464e4991_k]( Before the Juke Box, there was the Juke Joint, a reverberating sanctum of the Mississippi Delta and the indefinable heartbeat of southern African American culture. The traditional Juke Joint seems to have grown out of the landscape more than it was constructed. A ramshackle collection of lost and found, partner to the barrel house and…  [Continue Reading](   [I Wish I Could’ve Partied with the Prince of Saint-Germain](  [I Wish I Could’ve Partied with the Prince of Saint-Germain]( If you were living in Paris during the years that followed World War II and liked to party, you’d better have known Boris Vian. In 1950, he wrote the original guidebook to bohemian Paris and pioneered a movement which brought back the city’s “joie de vivre” that had been lost during the German occupation. Along with Jean Paul-Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, Boris symbolised intellectual café society in post-war Saint Germain and became the leading promoter of American jazz music in France....  [Continue Reading](   [Paris’ Utopian Village of Concrete Cabbage](  [Paris’ Utopian Village of Concrete Cabbage]( If Ernest Hemingway made Paris a moveable feast, architect Gérard Grandval made its Créteil suburb the vegetable course. Built during the 1970s, the Créteil Cabbages, or “Choux de Créteil,” are French Brutalism at its finest. The ‘utopian’ residency is composed of 10 otherworldly buildings whose balconies extend like giant, concrete petals – hence the nickname, “the cabbages” or “sprouts.”...  [Continue Reading](   [Cool Down and Reminisce over the Wonders of Ski Ballet](  [Cool Down and Reminisce over the Wonders of Ski Ballet]( There was a brief time in winter Olympic history when athletes would zip into their snow suites, strap on their skis, cue the music, and dance to victory. Ski ballet is like the love child of figure skating and skiing. Routines lasted for two minutes, and athletes competed alone or in pairs. The result was a unusual athletic feat set to music, and it had a brief, albeit memorable, Olympic career, gaining popularity in the 1970s, and fizzling out in the 1990’s....  [Continue Reading](   [Templar Secrets of Sintra’s Mysterious Initiation Well](  [eabd39b9-lm-27804-1550c25f7c0]( Hidden behind a cluster of moss-covered boulders in a Portuguese garden lies a well. It’s no ordinary well, as you’ll see when you push the stone slab that leads you to the top of an inverted tower that plunges into an underworld. With curving arches flanked by ionic columns, lichen and moss-clad stone dripping with…  [Continue Reading](   [Who was the 1920s Moulin Rouge Drag Queen that inspired Man Ray and Cocteau?](  [tumblr_oeky38JD1i1vcxjpbo1_1280]( If you had lived in 1920s Paris, you would know who Barbette was. She was an icon of the night. A muse to the greats. A pioneer of queer.  [Continue Reading](   [13 Things I Found on the Internet Today (Vol. DCXXXVI)](  [lovewagon]( [Continue Reading](  Interested in Becoming a MessyNessy Keyholder? [Apply now to unlock the Vault!](    [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Instagram]( [LinkedIn]( [Blog]( [To read more from MessyNessyChic visit the Blog]( and make sure you keep getting these email by adding contact@messynessychic.com to your address book or whitelist us. Our postal address: In a Café, Paris 75001 Want out of the loop? [Unsubscribe](.