Fantastic Voyage

Did you read last week's New York Times article, "Reclaiming Our (Real) Lives from Social Media"? I share the frustration felt by the article's author, Nick Bilton,  over time spent- and wasted- on social media.  What starts out as a quick morning check-in on Instagram or Facebook turns into an hour-long slog through status updates, sundry thoughts, and links to random websites.  As Bilton so aptly put it, "Yet I am blaming the Internet for sucking people into a cacophony of links, videos and pictures that are constantly being dangled in their faces like some sort of demented digital carrot on a stick."  Here, here.

While I try hard to avoid those labyrinthine visits to social media sites, I have no such qualms about time spent researching on the Internet.  Those twists, turns, and tunnels through which such research leads me usually result in my learning about places with which I am not familiar.  They also lead me to some really great photos.  And that was exactly what happened when I recently searched for German and Austrian porcelain rooms.  One room led to another, and before I knew it, I had spent close to two hours studying- and coveting- these paeans to porcelain.  But whereas I typically leave social media sites with not much to show for it, here I ended up with some beautiful photos, not to mention a bad case of wanderlust.

Schlossmuseum Oranienburg, Oranienburg, Germany

Porcelain Gallery at Schlossmuseum Arnstadt, Germany

Room of the Sibyls, Altenburg Palace, Germany

Neue Kammern, Park Sanssouci, Germany

Porcelain Cabinet, Schloss Eggenberg, Austria

Porcelain Collection at Zwinger Palace, Dresden, Germany; the design of the porcelain galleries was the handiwork of Peter Marino.

Porcelain Room, Schloss Charlottenburg, Germany