Page 6 of 6
Queens, New York
If I can’t believe in movie screens and leather, then I won’t believe in anything at all
The first four pages of the slideshow had pretty strong theming, something that is kind of falling apart as we close things out. Last page we started with Banana Ball and then followed a bit of a free association thing with baseball, then Citi Field, then the Unisphere, then two Queens (M)useums, then NYC Ferry, then Roosevelt and finally Governors Island. On this last page things aren’t necessarily starting with a lot of promise as we find ourselves back at a third museum in Queens, although maybe for once being in Queens has nothing to do with the theming.
We’re at the always terrific Museum of the Moving Image to see the Mission Impossible exhibit, a truly fun installation that included all sorts of props and even that stupid key that unlocked the AI thing from the very last two movies. Tom Cruise could have saved himself a lot of trouble and avoided swimming underwater in the icy ocean in his underwear for what seemed like an eternity by just coming to Queens instead.
The Museum of the Moving Image is more than just that Mission Impossible exhibit, there’s lots of other great things to see including the Blade Runner model, the Jim Henson exhibit and the lobby to Tunnel Industries. Extra credit is available for anyone who appreciates that last Tunnel Industries reference.
When it first opened, I became a member of The Shed, the Diller, Scofidio + Renfro designed art space at Hudson Yards, but I dropped my membership after a year since I was not a fan of the programming. Since then, I have really only been there sporadically, although I did go see Luna Luna twice and this year it was home to my favorite temporary exhibition of the year: Christo and Jeanne-Claude: The Gates and Unrealized Projects for New York City. It has been 20 years since The Gates appeared (briefly) in Central Park, and this exhibit, with models, drawings, videos and actual gates, was just amazing. Good job, The Shed.
The celebration of The Gates continued in Central Park, where (at certain locations only) a glitchy AR app allowed you to travel back in time an re-experience The Gates once again. The AR app was interesting (a fixed version of a screen capture is below) with most of the gates being in realistic places, although sometimes they would be noticeably off or in the middle of a tree.
My third favorite temporary exhibit (after The gates and Mission Impossible) was at MoMA where they celebrated The Many Lives of the Nagakin Capsule Tower, a residential building in Tokyo that has now been demolished. Designed by Kisho Kurokawa, the exhibit included an actual capsule, and while those bastards at MoMA would not allow you to go inside, you could still get pretty close and almost feel what it would be like to spend some time in the future, or to be more accurate, what the future might have been way back in 1972.
There were good temporary exhibits at the New York Historical Museum (most notably the one on The Power Broker), but instead I’m showing pictures from the general collection since everything here was new to me. Somehow I had never been here, a real miss on my part. Maybe it’s because of the location, although I never seemed to have trouble making it to the American Museum of Natural History across the street. Maybe it’s because of its name, a Historical Museum implies a dry, boring collection, although even the smallest amount of research would have proven that theory to be untrue. Maybe I just don’t have a good reason no matter how hard I try and grasp for one and maybe, for once, that’s ok.
The collections at the New York Historical Museum are not what you expect. One example is that I was surprised to see Thomas Cole’s The Course of Empire (pictured above), an image I constantly see in reference to the fall of Rome. I was also floored to see their tiffany lamp collection (pictured below), which was impressive in its size, its quality and also in the way it was presented. That room alone is worth the price of admission.
It’s easy to conflate the New York Historical Museum and the Museum of the City of New York. Both are located on Central Park but opposite sides, and both cover a lot of similar topics, although in far different ways. They may be similar, but only one of them (The Museum of the City of New York) holds an annual gingerbread house contest and exhibit, as three of these six images prove. As for the other three, two of them are from the free Gingerbread City display at the South Street Seaport while the last one, the Gingerbread Apocalypse, was on display in the lobby of the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick.
In what has become somewhat of a biennial tradition, we’re in Brooklyn on a cold December night to walk once again through Lightscape at the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. Every two years for a return visit seem about right, since enough time has passed that it feels fresh again and changes feel less incremental than they otherwise might. So if this tradition holds, that means that I’ll have to wait now until December 2027 before it’s time to walk the gardens, take too many pictures and debate whether or not it’s really worth it to wait in a really long line for some expensive hot chocolate.
Just days before 2026, or I guess hours (about 80 of them, to be more specific), I finally made it to another building that I was waiting to open. This is the absolutely spectacular view from the observation deck at One Times Square, which technically is in previews and also, thankfully, not busy yet. Downstairs the entire world is packed on the sidewalks and streets, but up here, the view is wide open. And what a view. Unlike other observation decks in the city, the one at One Times Square isn’t all that high, so the city isn’t just something that you stare down at but also something that surrounds you. A really magical experience that really makes you believe, at least for a moment, that Times Square really is the crossroads of the world.
2025 and the 2025 Weekend Trips Slideshow both come to an end right here at One Times Square as we stare at that giant 2026 and start to imagine what’s next. Sure, anything can happen, but (as always) there is always promise for the year ahead. There are still so many places I haven’t been and even more that I’d like to see again. With any luck I’ll be writing a 2026 Weekend Trips Slidehow this time next year, one filled with all of the unrelated random pictures and stories we have all come to love.
