Visit Langston Hughes' Apartment

From Gothamist comes word that an apartment long-occupied by Langston Hughes has now been turned into a museum. Hughes lived in the apartment from the late Forties until his death in 1967, at the age of 65.

The writer was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance, and throughout his life used his art to agitate in favour of greater civil rights, not just for blacks but for gays as well.

In life he was known as "the Poet Laureate of Harlem".

In Memoriam: Grand Duchess Anastasia

Whether she died in Ekaterinburg on July 17, 1918, or many decades later, was for years such a mystery that it generated a whole bevy of films, books, and many many column inches. As many as ten women claimed to be the Grand Duchess in the years after the death of the Romanovs, the most famous of whom was Anna Anderson.

Despite the discovery of the Imperial family's mass grave in the early 80s, and its exhumation in 1991, the matter has yet to be sufficiently settled.

RIP Gianfranco Ferre

Italian fashion designer Gianfranco Ferre has died of a cerebral hemorrhage. He was 62.

His emergence on Italy's fashion scene coincided with Giorgio Armani and Gianni Versace in the late 70s, which itself coincided with the rise of star designers Yves Saint Laurent, Emmanuel Ungaro and Pierre Cardin in France.

Ferre trained as an architect, which fashionistas love to say is what gave his clothes such impeccable "structure". God help us all (and especially the Duchess of Cornwall) if Frank Gehry decides he'd rather be a milliner.

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