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Here is a link to the 20 most beautiful museums in the world, according to Flavorwire. I’ve been to 7 of them (she said smugly) and can confirm that they are, indeed, mind-bogglingly gorgeous. The Hermitage is all in-your-face, you-know-you-can’t-top-this beautiful, as you would expect from a building commissioned by Catherine the Great. The Monet house and gardens at Giverny are serenely beautiful, like you’re walking through an Impressionist painting. The Louvre is, well, you know, the Louvre.

I wish I’d gotten the chance to visit the Chora Museum in Istanbul on my recent trip to Greece and Turkey. And I’m kicking myself for spending an entire summer in Dallas in 2001 (for work, not vacation), and never getting off my butt to drive 40 minutes to the Modern Art Museum in Fort Worth. One of these days I’ll drag my family to Toronto while we’re visiting the Great White North to check out the Ontario museum.

There may be some omissions. The biggest I can think of right now is the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, which used to be a Byzantine church and then a mosque and is now a national museum. I’m sure the Brits and Italians would have something to say about being left off.

Here’s me at the Hagia Sophia. Not a huge fan of those discs (though the Arabic calligraphy is gorgeous). The virgin and child mosaic 16 stories above my head is stunning…and about 1500 years old. This photo doesn’t even begin to capture how large this building is.