Rachel Kaplan's Illustrated Books

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Little-Known Museums In and Around Paris

By Rachel Kaplan
Published by Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

Where can you find the nightingale that sang for Maurice Ravel? Which museum in the heart of Paris has been called the smallest museum in the world?

For the first time Little-Known Museums In and Around Paris provides all the answers in a handy, entertaining, and beautiful guide to 30 remarkable, yet often overlooked, museums in the City of Light.

From the Monte Cristo Estate and Castle and the Museum of Baccarat Crystal to the Museum of Carnival Art and the Museum of Curiosities and Magic, this lavishly illustrated book offers readers an unparalleled glimpse into the little-known cultural and historic treasures of Paris.

What the critics have to say about
Little-Known Museums in and Around Paris

Library Journal:
It's written in an easy-to-read style that will make readers wish they were in Paris . . . A good choice for most large travel collections.

Newsday:
Small in size but large in glorious color photographs, this can be considered a mini-coffee table book candidate.

Conde Nast Traveler's Epicurious Website:
Her itinerary of atypical delights certainly beats standing with a headset amid the throng surrounding the Mona Lisa. Each museum gets an entry that's complete enough to cover the basic history, essential facts and quirky must-sees, but brief enough for Metro reading en route. It's a nice balance, perfect for sightseeing. Conde Nast Traveler's Epicurious Website.

The Art Book:
This handy traveller’s companion to Paris is a joy to hold, because it is sharply, but sensitively designed, and clearly written with a real-life reader in mind . . .I am waiting for the London version with bated breath.

House & Garden:
Beautifully produced and sufficiently compact to carry about with you, it describes and illustrates some thirty museums.

Birmingham Post:
Little-Known Museums In and Around Paris is a true antique collector's handbook, full of details of Paris museums few of us have heard of.

France Insider's News (a quarterly publication of the French Government Tourist Office):
This book ought to add a dimension of intriguing discovery to any trip to Paris. Author Rachel Kaplan has found 30 smaller museums that are surprising and diverse in both setting and subject matter.

Royal Academy Magazine:
Paris might be one of the most frequented of European cities but a new guide by Rachel Kaplan reveals a city of building and collections that few have explored. Little-Known Museums In and Around Paris says much about the city's art, culture and history through the intimacy of its collections. Kaplan takes you on an adventure, to the Montmartre of Erik Satie and the studio of Delacroix in the heart of Saint Germain. Share in her discoveries whether from the comfort of an armchair or in person.

CNN Travel News:
Sick of fighting the crowds at the Louvre and every other major museum in Europe? Take heart in two new books put together by Rachel Kaplan. Little-Known Museums, for both London and Paris, takes readers away from the crowds to museums that are often overlooked in two of Europe's most traveled cities. Plenty of pictures are included in book to help art aficianados find museums to match their taste.

The Viewpoint of the French Press

Yonne Magazine:
Les éditions Minerva et Rachel Kaplan (une journaliste américaine) leur rendent justice en publiant un joli Guide des musées insolites et méconnus de Paris et alentours. Le voyageur qui aime cheminer hors des sentiers battus y puisera de quoi satisfaire sa curiosité.

Gé Magazine:
Paris et la région parisienne recèlent tant de richesses! Mais connaissez-vous le musée des Arts forains, celui de la céramique, de la monnaie, de l'outil ou encore de la vie romantique? Ce guide vous les présente dans leur perspective d'époque, avec une abondante illustration qui met en bouche. Pour un jour, pour une semaine, la découverte de notre France insolite, un guide du bonheur de découvrir.

Est Éclair:
Rachel Kaplan mérite de chauds éloges pour son très brillant Guide des musées insolites et méconnus, Paris et alentours. Ce guide-album (broché, format 13,9x 24,1 cm), abondantes et superbes illustrations en couleur) charme l'oeil et l'esprit, lève des images, évoque d'invisibles présences. Architectures impressionantes par leur luxueuse harmonie, splendeurs cachées, objets d'art précieux . . .

Le Figaro (La Vie A Paris):
Le livre de Rachel Kaplan invite les touristes et les autochtones à sortir des sentiers battus.

La Croix:
C'est avec une grande générosité dans l'érudition que Rachel Kaplan a construit et rédigé son Guide des musées insolites et méconnus, réservé pour le moment à Paris et ses alentours, mais dont on voudrait la voir consacrer d'autres volumes au reste de la France. Rachel Kaplan donne du relief à tout ce qu'elle voit, et transforme en aventure historique, esthétique et sentimentale la moindre demi-heure passée dans ces endroits visiblement choisis pour leur capacité à enchanter. On voudrait tout visiter avec elle. Grâce à ce livre, c'est presque le cas.

Elle Décoration:
Ce guide très vivant se lit comme un roman, et l'on passe allègrement du château de Monte Cristo au musée Erik Satie, du domaine de Chaalis au musée Edith Piaf. En tout, une trentaine de notices, un choix d'illustrations qui donne envie de faire la visite, tous les renseignements pratiques et un index pour s'y reconnaître.

Gazette des Beaux Arts:
Un choix d'illustrations qui donne envie de faire la visite, tous les renseignements pratiques et un index pour s'y reconnaître...

French Government Cultural Authorities

Philippe Douste-Blazy, Minister of Culture:
Je vous félicite pour cet ouvrage dont la présentation vivante et l'iconographie qui l'illustre invitent les lecteurs à explorer des musées parfois méconnus du grand public.

Jean Tiberi, Maire de Paris:
Voici une très heureuse initiative qui attire l'attention sur des lieux plus confidentiels qui offrent au visiteur des impressions et des sensations miraculeusement préservées. Je souscris largement au choix qui a été le vôtre pour élaborer ce guide dont je salue tout à la fois la qualité des commentaires et des illustrations.

Little-Known Museums In and Around London

By Rachel Kaplan
Published by Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

Where in the heart of London can you find Princess Diana's magnificently restored ancestral home? Where can you find the "Big Beautiful Doll" that was the pride of the United States 78th Fighter Group based in England between 1943 and 1945?

For the first timeLittle-Known Museums In and Around Londonprovides all the answers in a handy, entertaining, and beautiful guide to 30 remarkable, yet often overlooked museums, in the largest city in the English-speaking world.

From the Bank of England Museum to the Bramah Tea & Coffee Museum to the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre and the Museum of Garden History, this lavishly illustrated guidebook offers readers an unparalleled glimpse into some of the cultural and historic gems of London and the surrounding countryside.

What the critics have to say about
Little-Known Museums in and Around London

The Manchester Guardian:
This book is exactly what it claims to be, it is fun to browse through and is useful.

The Financial Times:
If the test of a good guidebook is that it tells you things about your home town that you didn't know, Rachel Kaplan's Little-Known Museums In and Around London flies through.

Conde Nast Traveler's Epicurious Website:
Kaplan has located London museums to suit any sensibility . . . This book didn't disappoint . . . it imparts inside knowledge about the museums.

Maine Antique Digest:
London is one of the great tourist cities of the world... This book shows some rather neat places, 30 in all, to visit after or even before you've had your fill of the standard greats... I can't wait to get back to London.

Departures:
Splendid... tells you everything about 30 truly fascinating British collections you probably never heard of before.

MAG (Museums and Gallery Magazine, London):
It's well researched, unpretentious, and lots more entertaining than your average guidebooks...

Family Travel Times:
A highly unique book that's guaranteed to give even frequent visitors a new perspective on sightseeing.

New York Post:
When you've done Big Ben and Buckingham Palace, what next? Little-Known Museums In and Around London suggests 30 remarkable but often overlooked artistic, cultural and historical gems – from the delightful Museum of Childhood to the notorious Clink Prison.

Amazon.com:
Rachel Kaplan's Little-Known Museums In and Around London is a prize book detailing 30 museum gems that take you to neighborhoods well off the tour bus routes, providing insight into British culture from unusual perspectives. Kaplan's museums divulge a London you needn't save for a rainy day.

British Heritage:
What makes this guidebook a treat is not just Kaplan's careful choice of museums to feature, but the depth of her research and obvious pleasure in relating stories associated with each of the sites. She doesn't neglect any of the practical need-to-know details every guidebook should include – hours, location, telephone numbers, and a general description of what you'll see when you walk through the door – but in addition to this she takes on the role of tour guide, allowing armchair-bound readers to enjoy many of the same stories they might heart told by on-the-spot curators and guides.

Victoria Magazine:
Even seasoned travelers who return to France or England year after year will make delightful discoveries in two new guidebooks by Rachel Kaplan. Published by Abrams, Little-Known Museums In and Around Paris and its companion, Little-Known Museums In and Around London, bring to light remarkable, but often overlooked, collections in these two world capitals. Rachel's leads are very insightful for both destinations, providing complete addresses, highlights, hours and admission fees.

Little-Known Museums In and Around Berlin

By Rachel Kaplan
Harry N. Abrams

An inveterate Francophile and Europhile, Ms. Kaplan has completed her third volume, Little-Known Museums In and Around Berlin.

Where can you find Marlene Dietrich's clutch bag and dressing gown, together with a bottle of champagne ready to toast the Blue Angel? Which museums display an elaborate collection of Cold-War spying devices that were hidden in shoulder bags, gas station canisters, car doors, watering cans, even window boxes?

In March 1999, to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall, as well as the inauguration of Germany's new capital, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. published Little-Known Museums In and Around Berlin, a unique, lavishly illustrated, accessible guide that features practical information on 30 remarkable museums in Berlin and the surrounding countryside, including collection highlights, addresses, phone numbers, hours and terms of admission – everything needed to guarantee many memorable visits.

What the critics have to say about
Little-Known Museums in and Around Berlin

USA Today
"Not only will travelers find fascinating places to go, but the book reveals a wealth of interesting details."

The New York Times
"Little-Known Museums In and Around Berlin roams beyond the Reichstag, highlighting 30 often overlooked artistic, cultural and historical institutions."

Interiors Magazine
"Almost all of Kaplan's 30 chosen designs are rich in design resources... The book is notable for its legibly set off data on museum hours and travel directions, and by airy layouts with handsome tableaux photos."

Library Journal
"The quality of content and production will keep this guide useful for years to come."

Knight-Ridder News Service
"Before, after and most importantly during any trip to Berlin, Rachel Kaplan's indispensable guide is a handy and entertaining look at 30 often overlooked museums in and around the historic city... These off-the-beaten track treasures will delight and inspire even the most jaded traveler and provide insight into a complex culture in the best and worst of times."

Los Angeles Daily News
"Ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and just as the German government makes its historic move back to Berlin, a book has been published that will guide tourists beyond the newly restored Reichstag..."

Maine Antique Digest
"Want to visit the medieval village of Düppel or the largest teddy bear museum on the planet? All these places and many others are described in a new guidebook by Rachel Kaplan that will have you calling your travel agent before you have read half of it."

Manhattan Arts International
"As Berlin takes its place as a major world capital, Kaplan offers a handy, entertaining, useful guide to the fascinating but often overlooked museums in and around this historic city."

Book Passage
"This book is a revelation of the cultural riches of Berlin... Well-written and beautifully illustrated."

Excerpts from Little-Known Museums In and Around Rome

The Doria Pamphilj Gallery

It's not often than a man gives up a political position that is equivalent to secretary-of-state in order to marry and devote his life to amassing an extensive and impressive art collection. Yet, that is exactly what Prince Camillo Pamphilj chose to do when he gave up his appointment as cardinal nipote (the root word for "nepotism"), in order to marry the beautiful and wealthy Olimpia Aldobrandini in 1647. Nor did his unorthodox decision go over well with his uncle, Pope Innocent X; in fact, the Pope was so furious that he banished the couple from Rome for several years.

Still, after spending many enthralled hours inside the splendid state and private apartments of the Doria Pamphilj Gallery off Via del Corso, contemplating an art collection that boasts over 700 paintings and sculptures alone, one is compelled to believe that Camillo's decision was not only judicious, but even downright admirable.

From the moment one walks up the sweeping stone staircase, whose landing is set off by an imposing marble portrait bust, and enters the first state apartment known as the Poussin Room, where every inch of wall space is covered with large seventeenth-century landscape paintings, most of which are by Gaspar Dughet (Nicolas Poussin's brother-in-law), one cannot help but feel overwhelmed. With its double-row of floor-to-ceiling windows, its ceiling painted with the Pamphilj coat of arms and such allegorical scenes as Time Discovers Truth and Merit Crowns Virtue, not to mention its flamboyant red velvet-covered settees and chairs, and red marble-topped gilded wood consoles, the room is a study in bravura. Even if Camillo had decided to relinquish a certain kind of temporal power, he still wanted visitors to be suitably impressed with his position and wealth, as well as with the scope of his collection. He needn't have worried.

Visitors used to current museum installations, which generally tend to be well-lit and systematically organized, may be a bit taken aback by the profusion of works of art throughout the gallery and the lack of identifying labels. "During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, works of art were treated as elements in an overall decorative scheme, and patrons like Camillo commissioned works of art to fill every visible inch of wall space," notes Prince Jonathan Pamphilj, whose family still lives in the palace and who had a major role in the gallery's refurbishing in 1996. "We have wanted to remain true to the original spirit of the collection..."

A La Découverte des Plus Belles Routes Ile-de-France

By Rachel Kaplan

Rachel Kaplan is the co-author of a generously illustrated French travel guide documenting 20 itineraries and 300 sites of the remarkable Ile-de-France area, the region surrounding Paris, where thirty percent of France's population works and resides.

While most visitors and Parisians know that this region is home to the chateaux of Fontainebleau and Versailles, few of them realize that a quarter of this territory is covered with game-fille forests for hunting, hiking and camping, and that it possesses two splendid natural parks: in the Valley of the Chevreuse and in the Vexin.

Along the Seine and the Oise, home to such Impressionists as Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley, are 700 kilometers of navigable waters and thirty pleasure ports for boating. Not to be missed are such gastronomic delights as the mustard and Brie de Meaux, the honey from the Gâtinais, or the nut liqueur of Poissy, as well as a thousand other delightful products.

For those who are readers or esthetes, not to be missed is the Route des Ecrivains where you can discover the homes of Ivan Turgenev, Emile Zola, Alexander Dumas, Victor Hugo or Chateaubriand. History buffs won't want to miss the Medieval town of Provins, the Château of Vaux-le-Vicomte or the charming seventeenth-century town of Saint-Germain-en-Laye where Louis XIV was born and which boasts one of the finest archeological museums in the world.

What the critics Have to Say About
A La Découverte des Plus Belles Routes
Ile-de-France

Le Figaro:
Grâce à 29 itinéraires détaillés dans un nouveau guide, le Parisien peut, le temps d'un weekend, redécouvrir mille richesses cachées dans sa région.

Atlantic Magazine:
Les Parisiens n'ont pas le temps, paraît-il, de se transformer en explorateurs de musées, et l'information des touristes manque incontestablement d'imagination sur ce point. Eh bien, ce guide remédie à cette insuffisance en offrant le fil d'Ariane nécéssaire à la découverte de trente musées qui valent le détour. Il est bien construit, bien documenté, et son iconographie dépasse en qualité celle de bien d'autres guides consacrés.

Auto Journal:
Bien conçue avec des cartes pratiques et vingt-neuf propositions d'itinéraires intéressants, la collections A la Découverte des plus belles routes s'enrichit d'un nouveau titre consacré à la région d'Ile-de-France.

Inter Régions:
Tout est fait pour inviter au voyage dans cette région si riche à la fois de souvenirs historiques, mais aussi de présent et d'avenir.

Télérama Paris:
Le Francilien désoeuvré trouvera ici matière à occuper ses weekends entre flore, histoire, tradition et culture régionale.

Actualités Ile-de-France:
De châteaux en abbayes, de forêts en villages pittoresques, laissez-vous guider!

Search Now:

To purchase books by Rachel Kaplan search in Amazon.com for "Little-Known Museums" putting the quotes around the text.
Click here for a direct link.

For more information, contact Rachel Kaplan at contact@frenchlinks.com