The Mapparium

A stained-glass world that its owners decided never to correct.

Collection: Boston: More Stories · USA · Open in OpenStreetMap

The Publishing House, home of the Mapparium · ajay_suresh, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Listen to this place’s story in Peplos.

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After installing Peplos, return to this page and tap “Open this place in Peplos”.

How the story begins

There is a country inside this building called Tannu Tuva, and it stopped existing in 1944. It sits on a globe of stained glass thirty feet across, three stories tall, which you walk into and cross on a glass bridge. The architect, Chester Lindsay Churchill, was designing a publishing house for The Christian Science Monitor, and he took the idea from a big spinning globe in the lobby of the New York Daily News.

The rest is in the app. Peplos plays the full story when you reach the place. You can also listen ahead of time.

Visiting

Christian Science Plaza, 210 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston. Timed ticket: adults $6, ages 0 to 17 free (owner's site, read 5 November 2026). Monday to Saturday 10 to 5, Sunday 11 to 5, last tour 4:40 pm. Closed 11 November, 25 to 27 November and 23 to 26 December 2026.