Quick Stops in Kansas City, Missouri

Here are some of the other sites that we visited in Kansas City (Missouri) during our travels.

Christopher Elbow Chocolates

I had Christopher Elbow Chocolates on my radar as a place to stop while in town. I was on the fence – we don’t need chocolate, and really, how exciting could it be?

Well, I’m here to tell you these were some of the most beautiful chocolates I have ever seen. They were also delicious – so creamy and smooth. It was worth a stop just to ogle and drool.

I made sure that we went shortly after eating, on the premise that we wouldn’t spend a lot of money. That worked super well, we only spent $70!

Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art

*Campiello del Remer, Ireland*, 1996,Dale Chihuly.

Palazzo di Loredana Balboni, 1996, Dale Chihuly. This was in a vestibule, and there was an identical one on the opposite wall.

If you’ve ever been in a contemporary art museum with me, you’ll know I don’t do very well. I mostly just don’t “get” it. Doug, on the other hand, likes them, so you’ll find me trailing along after him trying to be quiet as I mutter to myself.

The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art is small, so it didn’t take very long to spin through. I was happy to discover not one, but two Chihuly’s, though they were both monochromatic and didn’t do much for me, especially the clear one.

There was one bit of unexpected fun, and that was their cafe area. The walls are all painted with The History of Art by Frederick James Brown. It includes 110 works of art all painted by Brown, some original, some in homage to. I had the directory, and Doug tried to see if he could guess the artist that each panel was supposed to represent. That was extra fun when I didn’t realize that three walls had the same pattern to them, and insisted Doug wasn’t very good with his guessing — but then he figured out that I was looking at the directory wrong and he was mostly r-r-r-r…not wrong.

The museum, which opened in 1994, is free, and rotates its art regularly, so repeat visits will result in varied experiences.

A portion of *The History of Art* by Frederick James Brown.

*Mu Nu (Mother and Daughter)*, 1997, Hung Liu

TWA Museum

In 1968, TWA rolled out their marketing program “Foreign Accent Service”, designed to create an cosmopolitan image. Check out this ridiculous uniform this flight attendant has been directed to wear…but wait for it…

Take a good look at this uniform…can you tell that it is made out of paper? PAPER! No, it’s not some obscure fabric terminology, it was truly made of paper. I can’t imagine a desk job in this, never mind the active job of flight attendant. The program lasted less than a year.

Uniforms for the “Blue Chip” flights between Chicago and LaGuardia, New York. The full outfit includes a matching jacket and earrings. The flights departed every half hour and included frills like steak dinners and local weather and traffic reports.

Apparently Doug whet his appetite on airline museums when we visited Delta, as it certainly wasn’t me that was interested in visiting a museum related to a defunct airline. Trans World Airlines (TWA) operated from 1930 until it was acquired by American Airlines in 2001. Its headquarters were located in Kansas City from 1931 to 1964.

The TWA Museum mission is to “to preserve and celebrate the extraordinary legacy” of TWA. I personally found it underwhelming in the extreme, but Doug seemed to get some enjoyment out of it.

Me explaining to Doug how I’m totally prepared to fly this thing!

First Class China service, complete with packs of cigarettes!

Holy cow, did airlines really used to provide information like this?

Community Christian Church (Frank Lloyd Wright)

The building squats on the ground. Also, Kansas City has so much street construction going on, it is just not possible they’re working on it all at once.

Frank Lloyd Wright was commissioned to design the Community Christian Church in 1940, after a fire destroyed their previous building. Though envisioned by Wright as “the church of the future”, I have to say it is one of his least inspired designs both inside and out. There was very little pretty about it.

You can read about the design and building process on the church website, which is full of typical Wright stories. Of course we don’t need air conditioning! This design will require virtually no maintenance! What do you mean we need to follow the city’s outdated building codes!