Staves, storm-calling, and of course, necropants.

A European-style bath house in Chicago.

A Museum of Holography frozen in 1974.

Grand opera on a miniature scale.

The murals have transformed a residential alley into a vibrant drive-through gallery.

This cemetery is all that remains of a school for "wayward" girls.

This architectural stunner is one of the few surviving Egyptian Revival theaters in the U.S.

This urban drawbridge gained eternal pop culture fame when the Blues Brothers jumped it while it was raised.

In the loving memory of a tragically deceased role-player this Illinois park is decked out with both dungeons and dragons.

Tour the luxe "glass cage" that inspired and unnerved the architecture world upon its debut.

In a quiet north Chicago neighborhood rests a stunning relic of the golden age of earthenware design.

The legacy of an unsolved, gruesome murder rests beneath the spans of this historic bridge.

The mysterious white squirrels of this Illinois city are treated like sacred cows.

The world's largest collection of the world's largest objects is in one small Illinois town.

A six-story-tall golden pyramid, surrounded by a moat.

This sprawling mini-golf empire is an impressive testament to a disappearing attraction.

This elaborate Hindu temple is located in a Chicago suburb, but looks like it was transported directly from India.

Former hotel turned into haunted playground.

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

Shop of curiosities with a dinosaur museum tucked in its basement.

The subtle science of a master molecular gastronomist.

A once-booming Mississippi River town with a history of racial violence is now eerie and mostly abandoned.

A century-old hotspot for jazz, frequented by everyone from Charlie Chaplin to Al Capone.

A monument to the art of slicing people open.