Viktor Wynd’s Cabinet of Wonders

By Viktor Wynd, with photography by Oskar Proctor and illustrations by the Theatre of Dolls

Let the inimitable aesthete Viktor Wynd guide you through a subversive celebration of curiosities, art, mess, decay, and self indulgence, passionately arguing that the world is full of wonder that is in danger of being sanitized and that collectors are the ultimate artists. The Viktor Wynd Museum in East London is arranged with the sensibility of a 17th-century Wunderkabinett. It displays and sells an eccentric and seemingly random collection of objects—everything from shrunken heads to narwhal tusks—united only by the sense of wonder they inspire in their curator. Now, Wynd takes readers on a tour of homes, private collections and museums that share his fondness for things arcane, desiccated, antique, or just plain odd. The book visits rarified locations lovingly curated by bohemians and artists: from a rambling Devon farmhouse and its historic taxidermy to an Italianate villa in East London to the House of Dreams Museum. It also includes advice on how to start a collection of your own, covering details on auction houses, private dealers, flea markets and fairs, and shows that having distinctive taste does not necessarily require a massive budget.