Messy Nessy Chic
messynessychic.com · Personal blog · on HN since 2013
Messy Nessy Chic is a pop-culture blog about history, odd places, vintage design and Parisian curiosities.
What HN saysHN commenters link it as a source for stories on WWI's Zone Rouge, the segregated Paris Metro, the Osaka World's Fair and Barbie history.
110HN people shared it
34linked it in comments
137stories submitted
2.1Kstory points
1 year agolast shared
2013people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1France’s Zone Rouge – A Forbidden No Man’s Land Poisoned by War (2015)6 people · 304 points · first shared 2015 · 54 comments on HN
- 2The Forgotten Giant Arrows that Guide you Across America4 people · 6 points · first shared 2013 · 1 comments on HN
- 3The Paris Time Capsule Apartment3 people · 41 points · first shared 2013 · 9 comments on HN
- 4A Brief Compendium of When Buttons Ruled the Earth (2016)3 people · 6 points · first shared 2016 · 1 comments on HN
- 5The Paris Metro Was Segregated by a Class System3 people · 1 points · first shared 2023 · discussion on HN
- 6Found at Auction: The Unseen Photographs of a Legend that Never Was2 people · 138 points · first shared 2013 · 23 comments on HN
- 7Online Shopping in the 1950s2 people · 114 points · first shared 2016 · 21 comments on HN
- 8The Fake Townhouses Hiding Mystery Underground Portals2 people · 64 points · first shared 2014 · 19 comments on HN
- 9More than 100 Years before 3D Printers, We had Photosculpture2 people · 12 points · first shared 2022 · discussion on HN
- 10The FBI’s Colossal Fingerprint Factory2 people · 8 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
- 11So Today I went shopping for a Used Submarine2 people · 5 points · first shared 2013 · discussion on HN
- 12Is MacPaint the Most Underrated Form of Outsider Art?2 people · 5 points · first shared 2019 · discussion on HN
- 13Tehran’s Desert Ghost Towers2 people · 4 points · first shared 2019 · discussion on HN
- 14The Ghost Army of WWII That Duped Hitler2 people · 3 points · first shared 2015 · discussion on HN
- 15Fake Chalets: Unmasking the Bunkers Disguised as Quaint Swiss Villas (2015)2 people · 2 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
gernb · 2022-04-25
Left over from some expo in Osaka might be the most amazing and also ugly giant thing ever created
https://www.messynessychic.com/2020/02/12/the-1970-osaka-worlds-fair-w…
The Tower of the Sun
https://www.google.com/search?q=Tower+of+the+Sun+osaka&tbm=isch
One Piece, one of the most popular Japanese manga/anime for the 20 years, even made fun of the artist, Tarō Okamoto, by having a character that had the power to turn other people in to "art" in the style of "Tarō Okamoto" and would spout lines about how she was an "arteest!"
URSpider94 · 2016-02-11
I get your point, and I think it's a reasonable point of view. I guess my belief is a little different -- I feel like people are fairly bad judges of what something is worth culturally. Sure, we get the high points right, but the Internet is chock full of stories of undiscovered genius that nearly ended up in the trash bin. See for example http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/02/18/found-at-auction-the-unseen-p…
Soundcloud contains an incredible collection of sound clips. If you take the virtual bulldozer to it, then you're just increasing the chance that something of value doesn't get copied over to archive.org or freesound.org, because the original owner isn't willing or able to do so.
sandworm101 · 2016-01-30
Wow. Anyone who thinks Barbie isn't the best role model, or that she pushes an unrealistic image on young girls, read this link I found at the bottom of the OP.
http://www.messynessychic.com/2012/10/26/the-little-barbie-that-grew-b…
dustincoates · 2025-03-21
The Paris métro had it until the early 90s, although it had been not so well enforced by the time they got rid of it.
https://www.messynessychic.com/2014/12/04/that-time-the-paris-metro-wa…
jabl · 2024-08-26
In France and Belgium, they dig up something like 900 tons on WWI munitions per year. At this pace they estimate that they're done in another 300-700 years. And the decomposing shells leach nasty stuff like mercury and arsenic, poisoning the soil.
https://www.messynessychic.com/2015/05/26/the-real-no-go-zone-of-franc…
CobrastanJorji · 2023-11-07
That's a neat article, but the picture referencing an "escort card" has sent me down a crazy rabbit hole. This is some grade A 19th cringey, red-pill style flirting! I can just see the catalog saying "Cat got your tongue? Women looking at other men? Order our stylish escort cards and you won't be left sitting on our fence! Only five cents!" Look at these insane things: https://www.messynessychic.com/2015/04/21/the-19th-century-escort-card…
Half of them have the gall to ask that they be returned if the lady doesn't want to go home with them. Those cards aren't free, after all! And the default-yes "do nothing if you want to sleep with me" wording, my god!
ajb · 2023-11-07
People will eat anything when necessary. This is a famous restaurant menu from the 1870 siege of Paris: https://www.messynessychic.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Menu-siegede…
It contains entries such as Consommé d'Eléphant, Le Civet de Kangourou, and Le Chat flanquè de Rats
bemusedthrow75 · 2023-08-03
But since you do not have access to colour originals of historical photos in almost every instance, you cannot possibly train the network to have any instinct for the colour sensitivity of the medium, can you?
An extreme example:
https://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/51/archibald.php
https://www.messynessychic.com/2016/05/05/max-factors-clown-contouring…
Colourising old TV footage can only result in a misrepresentation, because the underlying colour is false to have any kind of usable representation on the medium itself.
And this caricatured example underpins the problem with colourisation: contemporary bias is unavoidable, and can be misleading. Can you take a black and white photo of an African-American woman in the 1930s and accurately colour her skin?
You cannot.
papa-whisky · 2023-07-27
Tangentially related: https://www.messynessychic.com/2019/04/26/the-lost-floating-pools-of-p…
tmnvix · 2023-06-21
There certainly were. Eldridge Cleaver (former Black Panther and Presidential candidate) invented the 'Cleavers'.
https://www.messynessychic.com/2013/08/01/the-1970s-political-activist…
maxmouchet · 2023-06-18
Anectodally, Paris metro used to have two classes: https://www.messynessychic.com/2014/12/04/that-time-the-paris-metro-wa…
fortran77 · 2022-10-10
Hackaday isn't the worst "repackager", but I always like to go to the original source for the article: https://www.messynessychic.com/2022/09/28/more-than-100-years-before-3…
max_ · 2022-01-06
1950's America had online shopping.[0]. This may be the closest thing to today's websites.
[0]https://www.messynessychic.com/2016/01/14/online-shopping-in-the-1950s…
cmrdporcupine · 2021-03-16
Have you ever seen the photos from Expo 1937 in Paris? Or read about it?
The organizers put the USSR and Nazi Germany directly across from each other... talk about "unifying vision" ...
https://www.messynessychic.com/2016/09/21/when-paris-invited-both-the-…
mc32 · 2021-01-06
The paskistani trucks remind me more of Philippine Jeepneys[1] than the japanese art trucks. The art 18-wheelers in Japan can get pretty crazy though[2]. Some look like casinos on wheels.
[1] http://neocha.com/magazine/art-of-the-jeepney/
[2] https://www.messynessychic.com/2013/08/29/the-japanese-subculture-of-t…
app4soft · 2020-11-02
JFTR, DYK There was a Full-Scale Replica of the Paris (uncompleted) just in 25 kilometers from real Paris.[0,1,2]
[0] https://www.messynessychic.com/2013/04/03/so-today-i-learned-that-fran…
[1] https://theculturetrip.com/europe/france/paris/articles/seeing-double-…
[2] https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-french-built-a-fake-paris-to-fool-ge…
andai · 2019-11-06
Here’s a nice gallery of “houses” :)
https://www.messynessychic.com/2015/06/26/fake-chalets-unmasking-the-b…
bogomipz · 2018-07-29
Or the Zone Eouge in France. The pictures here are particularly sobering:
http://www.messynessychic.com/2015/05/26/the-real-no-go-zone-of-france…
I've heard different estimates from it will take 300 years to clear the UXO from the Zone Route to it will never be truly free of UXO.
gaius · 2016-10-30
Also check out these old photos of Afghan: http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/06/10/lost-in-time-groovy-afghanist…
twic · 2016-10-30
You may be interested in these photos by Camilo José Vergara, where he took pictures of the same building or street over a span of decades:
http://www.messynessychic.com/2016/10/26/for-over-40-years-this-guy-ph…
Bronze_Colossus · 2016-10-12
Here is a few more picture more:
http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/11/15/the-forgotten-giant-arrows-th…
I also find these kind of things cool. Forgotten structures that once served an important roll but now are mostly forgotten.
hammock · 2016-07-18
Downtown Chicago has a number of electrical substations that are disguised as buildings. If you are just driving past you would probably have no idea. See photos here: http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/12/13/lights-on-but-nobody-home-beh…
e12e · 2016-07-05
A little more in this link posted to hn a while back:
"The Real “No-Go Zone” of France: A Forbidden No Man’s Land Poisoned by War"
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9609091
http://www.messynessychic.com/2015/05/26/the-real-no-go-zone-of-france…
dang · 2015-11-15
Url changed from http://www.messynessychic.com/2014/06/26/that-time-walt-disney-bought-… which points to this.
strictnein · 2015-09-08
These still exist to a degree in the Netherlands:
http://www.messynessychic.com/2012/10/17/the-era-of-automatic-dining-l…
sampo · 2015-05-15
Progress, prosperity and a heavy metal music subculture.
http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/12/27/the-heavy-metal-subculture-of…
huuu · 2014-10-15
Also check this 70 years untouched Paris apartment: http://www.messynessychic.com/2012/05/09/the-paris-time-capsule-apartm…
DavidAdams · 2014-03-20
I read something a couple of years ago about the phenomenon of expats fleeing Dubai after the economic downturn because of the Emirates' harsh treatment of debtors (no bankruptcy, pay up or be jailed). Supposedly, it was common for people to just abandon their cars at the airport and high tail it out of town, never to return. I just found a delightful article highlighting the phenomenon of swanky luxury cars being abandoned at the airport or on the streets. I suspect that this is the main justification for the imposition of an exit visa. But of course the upshot is probably that British financiers end up fleeing their debts anyway, while poor Bangladeshis suffer indentured servitude.
http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/05/21/so-in-dubai-the-amount-of-aba…
pstack · 2014-01-18
This is entirely common, all over the world. Maintenance, accesses, and vents to the New York subway system are hidden behind non-existent town and row-houses and you can discover them if you pan around Google Maps for awhile.
http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/01/29/the-fake-townhouses-hiding-my…
bane · 2013-05-14
Though mostly candid, the shots look almost like she spent hours posing the models, setting up the lighting and set, getting the wardrobe and hair just right...plus there's an interesting pattern to the shots, how everything is just at a certain, interesting, inquisitive height, just a hair below the normal person's eye level (explained by her selfie [1]) nevertheless it asks the viewer to take on the role of a child, maybe 10 to 12, in an adult's world, looking up at adults, and down at very young children...her photography is astonishing in it's ability to draw you into the moment with this queer subjects that she's managed to find
1 - http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/02/18/found-at-auction-the-unseen-p…