A day in Brooklyn

The Brooklyn Museum
see all photos »

The Brooklyn Museum is a perfect museum for a one-day visit. Its collections are varied enough to suit every taste and yet, most of it can be satisfactorily seen in one day. On June 17, 2006, a warm spring day, I went to Brooklyn. I took the NJ Transit train into Penn station (40 mins) and the 2/3 subway to Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn (30 mins).

The Brooklyn Museum is right outside the subway station. It is a beautiful Beaux-Arts building, a style which flourished between 1885 and 1920 and combines ancient Greek and Roman forms with Renaissance ideas. The Brooklyn Museum has 19^th century American landscapes, Native-American and Spanish art, African totem poles, early Italian religious Renaissance paintings, Rodin sculpture, a replica of the Statue of Liberty, a couple of Tiffany windows, a beautiful Moorish room from the Rockefeller House, Chinese, Japanese and Indian art, Islamic textiles, Egyptian tablets, cheerfully painted Egyptian coffins, fragile papyrus and even a preserved mummy (is that for real?) from ancient Egypt! The museum’s mission statement mentions the richness of world cultures and the diversity of its audience. It certainly embodies this diversity in its varied collections.

A day at the Brooklyn Museum and Botanic Garden

Brooklyn Botanic Garden
see all photos »

The Brooklyn Botanic Garden is adjacent to the museum. I visited in June when the garden was celebrating Rose Month at the Cranford Rose Garden. There were thousands of roses of all colors and types. Funny names like Dairy Maid, Dainty Maid, Little Bo-Peep, Blast Off and even Chevy Chase and Angela Lansbury. Cherry blossoms were past their peak when I went. Lots of plants, trees and bushes, all well documented. There was a wedding too, at the end of the Cherry Esplanade. Also a herb garden and a Japanese garden.