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A List of Don'ts for Women on Bicycles circa 1895
by Maria Popova “Don’t ask, ‘What do you think of my bloomers?’” We’ve already seen how the bicycle emancipated women , but it wasn’t exactly a smooth ride. The following list of 41 don’ts for female cyclists was published in 1895 in the newspaper New York World by an author of unknown gender. Equal parts amusing and appalling, the list is the best (or worst, depending on you look at it) thing since the Victorian map of woman’s heart . Don’t be a fright.
by Maria Popova What a housefly has to do with Tim Burton and everything that makes snail mail great. It’s no secret I’m an enormous fan of Edward Gorey’ s, mid-century illustrator of the macabre, whose work influenced generations of creators, from Nine Inch Nails to Tim Burton.
Floating Worlds: Edward Gorey's Never-Before-Seen Letters and Illustrated Envelopes
From Darth Vader to Jesus: Famous Lives in Minimalist Pictograms
by Maria Popova From the guillotine to lightsabers, or what vintage visual language has to do with pop culture. From Milan-based creative agency H-57 comes this brilliant series of minimalist pictogram posters for the life-and-times of famous characters, both fictional and historical, from Darth Vader to Marie Antoinette to Jesus — part Isotype , part Everything Explained Through Flowcharts , part something entirely and ingeniously its own.
by Maria Popova Oceans, omnivores, and what babies have to do with design manifestos.
Earth Day the TED Way
The Stanford Prison Experiment Turns 40
by Maria Popova Insights on identity and the aberrations of authority from the most notorious psychology experiment of all time. Forty years ago today, the Stanford Prison Experiment began — arguably history’s most notorious and controversial psychology experiment, which gleaned powerful and unsettling insights into human nature.
by Maria Popova What uniform motion has to do with religion, or what Galileo can teach us about consciousness.
50 Famous Scientists on God, Part 2
Illustrated Portraits by 80 of the World's Most Exciting Artists
by Maria Popova What Stephen Hawking’s eyebrows have to do with Amy Winehouse and the artist as a storyteller. Hardly does the responsibility of art get more intricate than in portraiture, with its expectation of capturing a person’s entire character and history with a few strokes of the proverbial brush.Bruce Gilden on the Other Side of The Camera
by Maria Popova What Coney Island mobsters have to do with Haiti and the smell of New York City streets.by Maria Popova From Darwin’s marginalia to Voltaire’s correspondence, or what Dalí’s controversial World’s Fair pavilion has to do with digital myopia.