Top of the World
Altadena’s Bunny Museum, home to the world’s “largest collection of rabbit-related items,” according to Guinness World Records. The 35,400 items — from plush toys to matchbooks to costumes –– multiply rapidly: Curators Candace Frazee and Steve Lubanski gift each other with a rabbit-themed offering each day. The tradition began in 1993, when Lubanski gave his then-girlfriend a plush bunny for Valentine’s Day. The couple soon began exchanging daily rabbit-related gifts. They wed a year later; Lubanski showed up at the reception in a bunny suit. “This museum is based on a love story,” said Frazee, who in 1998 launched the now nonprofit museum in the couple’s Pasadena home. The collection moved to Altadena few years ago. Amid the scent of carrot cake candles, Frazee recently gave a tour of the 7,000-square-foot exhibition space. A blast of bunnies hits one upon entering the warren of 16 galleries; it’s like stumbling into an art installation designed to stupefy by shock immersion.Displays burst with rabbit-shaped and bunny-branded objects sorted into 111 categories and include cookie jars, lunch pails, slot machines, music boxes, chocolate, thimbles and characters (such as Bugs Bunny and Thumper).
