The Backyard Tourist

10/10/2026

What do vintage handbags have to do with a former state hospital? More than you might think.

For National Handbag Day, I’m taking you somewhere unexpected: the Vintage Purse Museum in Manteno, Illinois.

When I first visited, I expected beautiful vintage handbags. And there are plenty of those! But I discovered so much more.

Housed in a circa-1928 administrative building at the former Manteno State Hospital, this museum is actively restoring and preserving a piece of Illinois history while celebrating the artistry, fashion, and stories behind the bags we carry.

Inside, you’ll find handbags displayed by decade and theme, along with a Barbie room, a comic book room, and a particularly moving military room.

It’s a wonderful reminder that the best road-trip discoveries often happen when a place surprises you.

And now, in honor of National Handbag Day, I have a question for you:

**What’s the most memorable handbag you’ve ever owned?**

Was it your first designer bag, a thrift-store treasure, a purse passed down from your mother or grandmother, or the one you carried everywhere for years?

Tell me the story in the comments! I suspect our handbags have more stories to tell than we give them credit for.

Read the full story on *The Backyard Tourist* and discover why this unexpected Illinois museum deserves a spot on your cultural road-trip list.

Manteno, IL An unexpected story of fashion, women’s history, historic preservation, and the power of creating opportunities for everyone. There are places you visit because you love their collectio…

10/09/2026

Looking for something different to do this weekend? Take the scenic route to Savanna, Illinois.

Tucked away along the Mississippi River, Savanna is home to one of Illinois’ most unexpected historic treasures: Havencrest Castle.

Yes, a castle. In Illinois.

Built in the early 20th century, Havencrest is the kind of place that makes you wonder how you’ve driven past it—or lived in Illinois this long—without knowing it was there.

It’s also exactly the kind of destination I love finding for The Backyard Tourist: historic, a little quirky, photogenic, and worth the drive.

So if you’re looking for a fall weekend road trip, skip the interstate and head west. Explore Savanna, take in the Mississippi River scenery, and add Havencrest Castle to your itinerary.

**Read my latest Backyard Tourist post:**
Havencrest Castle: An Illinois Castle Worth the Drive

Because sometimes the best travel discoveries are hiding in your own backyard.

Where will you take the scenic route this weekend?

Savanna, Illinois There are historic houses that tell you exactly what life was like in another era. And then there is Havencrest. Perched on a hill above the Mississippi River town of Savanna, Ill…

10/05/2026

What is Your Signage Saying to Your Guests?

On a recent trip, I visited a beautiful old basilica attached to a monastery. It was the kind of place that makes you instinctively lower your voice when you walk through the door. Beautiful architecture. Centuries of history. The sort of place where you want to linger and look closely at every detail. Photography was allowed—but not during Mass. The church had a sign explaining the policy....

On a recent trip, I visited a beautiful old basilica attached to a monastery. It was the kind of place that makes you instinctively lower your voice when you walk through the door. Beautiful archit…

10/05/2026

It’s banned book week. Can you believe we still have to have this conversation?
What banned books will YOU read this week?
https://pen.org/banned-books-list-2026/

10/05/2026

Children’s Museums Are Not Just Indoor Playgrounds. And That’s an Important Distinction.

I have spent much of my career thinking about how museums help people connect with ideas, stories and the world around them. One of the things I have come to appreciate most is that children’s museums take the concept of experiential learning seriously. And yet, children’s museums are sometimes dismissed as little more than indoor playgrounds. I understand why. Walk into one on a busy Saturday and you might see children climbing, running, building, pretending, pouring water, pushing buttons and making an impressive amount of noise....

I have spent much of my career thinking about how museums help people connect with ideas, stories and the world around them. One of the things I have come to appreciate most is that children’s muse…

10/04/2026

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10/02/2026

This is, IMHO, the coolest Old Time Streetscape in the Midwest. Milwaukee started this trend in 1965, and exhibits followed in Detroit, Grand Rapids, and MSI in Chicago.

The Milwaukee Public Museum will spotlight its iconic Streets of Old Milwaukee and European Village in the final installment of its year-long Greatest Hits farewell exhibit celebrations. ⬇️

10/02/2026

This is very upsetting!

10/01/2026

This is a brilliant idea! The public has no idea how difficult funding repairs can be. Donors love big, sexy, visible projects. This often leaves repair work underfunded, and deferred.

Museums can often be too shy about their precarious financial position, so we found this idea really interesting.

The Museum of Vancouver is running "Austerity Tours," behind-the-scenes walkthroughs that show the public what decades of stagnant funding actually look like. There's a lobby light fixture leaking hydraulic fluid, a drip tray catching water from a failing HVAC system, and a collections freezer that has run nonstop since 1968 and no longer has its maintenance funded.

What I love about this is the honesty. Most institutions hide these problems because they worry it looks like failure. MOV is doing the opposite: turning the building itself into the argument. You can read a funding report and forget it by lunch. It's much harder to forget standing next to a 58-year-old freezer that protects an entire collection.

The timing is sharp too, with the tours landing just before Vancouver's civic election and BC's provincial election.

Other cultural organizations should be taking notes. Our audiences often have no idea what it takes to keep these places running, and showing them may be the most persuasive case we can make.

Tours run through October 17. Worth a visit if you're in Vancouver.