Waterfront Museum and Emporium

Ye Olde Curiosity Shop: Seattle's Century-Old Cabinet of Wonders

Seattle, Washington, United States

By the Wicked Cool Places editors · Published Wed, Mar 18, 2026 · Updated Sat, Jul 25, 2026

Why it’s cool

Since 1899, this family-run waterfront institution has housed a bizarre collection of natural and man-made marvels. From naturally preserved mummies to mechanical sideshow toys, it is a living time capsule of Victorian-era curiosity.

Pacific Northwest Historic

Joseph Standley’s obsession with the strange began with a third-grade prize for a tidy desk, but it eventually grew into one of the Pacific Northwest’s most enduring landmarks. Established in , this shop has spent more than a century serving as a repository for the bizarre and the beautiful.

While the storefront has moved along the Seattle waterfront over the decades, the core of the collection remains a family legacy, now maintained by the fourth generation of the Standley lineage.

Why It Stands Out

The shop operates as a hybrid between a traditional souvenir stand and a museum of the macabre. A similar atmosphere of morbid curiosity can be found at Woolly Mammoth Antiques and Oddities.

Tucked between kitschy magnets and hand-carved art, you will find "Medical Ed," a cadaver head from the early th century featuring intricate brass hinges that allow his skull to be opened for study. Nearby, the resident mummies, Sylvester and Sylvia, rest in glass cases.

Sylvia is a naturally preserved immigrant from Central America, while Sylvester, long rumored to be a frontier outlaw, bears mysterious shotgun pellets in his face that were discovered during modern forensic testing. The rafters and walls are a chaotic gallery of the impossible.

This eclectic display of found objects mirrors the spirit of The Treasures in the Trash Collection. A grimacing Fiji Mermaid, allegedly captured near Duckabush, hangs overhead, while a three-tusked walrus skull and a rare narwhal tusk compete for space.

The shop also features a collection of vintage mechanical amusements, including "Black Bart," a one-armed bandit slot machine that was once confiscated by authorities on suspicion of illegal gambling before being returned to the shop floor.

Before You Go

The shop is currently located on Pier , a central hub of the Seattle waterfront. It is easily identifiable and sits right next to the famous Ivar’s Restaurant.

While there is no admission fee to view the curiosities, the space is a functioning retail store, so expect a mix of serious collectors and tourists browsing for trinkets.

Questions worth answering

What is the cost to see the mummies and other oddities?

We don't pay a fee to enter this storefront. It functions as a working retail space where you can browse the collection for free.

Where exactly is the shop located on the waterfront?

You'll find it at Pier 54. It's situated right beside the well-known Ivar's Restaurant.

How long has this place been around?

The Standley family started this business back in 1899. A fourth generation of the same lineage still manages the collection today.

What kind of atmosphere should we expect inside?

It's a historic mix of a museum and a gift shop. The vibe is chaotic and leans into the macabre, with our own editorial from there.

Visit Snapshot

The shop is situated on Pier along the Seattle waterfront, located immediately adjacent to Ivar's Restaurant.

Location

Seattle, Washington

Know before you go

The current shop is easy to spot on Pier , next to Ivar's Restaurant.

Editorial source

Ye Olde Curiosity Shop

A lifelong passion for curiosities was inspired by winning the book Wonders of Nature in third grade for having the neatest desk. Joseph Standley (-) became an avid collector of Indian and Eskimo artifacts, as well as natural curiosities.

He opened Ye Olde Curiosity Shop in to house the many unusual artifacts that he had collected. Though it's changed locations a few times, the century-old shop and much of the original collection remains today, passed down through four generations.

Among its many wonders, the collection includes a large display of shrunken heads, a three-tusked walrus skull, a working merry-go-round organ, a narwhal tusk, and a pair of famous mummies. Much of the modern store is taken up by trinkets and souvenir items of varying authenticity (Seattle fridge magnets are side-by-side with mounted insect specimens and hand-carved Native American art), but the walls and display cases are crammed with the original curiosities that made the store famous.

Medical Ed is a preserved cadaver head which served as a dissection aid for medical students in the early s. His face and skull have been divided and hinged to open on tiny brass pins, and his skull pops open from the top.

A small collection of mechanical toys and sideshow contraptions are scattered around the store, many of them still coin-operated. The most famous of these is an old "one-armed bandit" slot machine named "Black Bart" that was at one time removed from the store on suspicion of being a functioning gambling machine.

Black Bart has since been restored to his place of honor. The two most famous items in the collection are Sylvester and Sylvia, the resident mummies.

Propped up in glass cases at the back of the shop next to displays of Ecuadorian shrunken heads (which may or may not be monkeys) and World War II ration booklets, the two have a mysterious past. Sylvia is believed to have been a Spanish immigrant to Central America, where she succumbed to tuberculosis at around the age of .

She was buried and naturally mummified, now weighing in at only pounds. Sylvester was long thought to be a cowboy or highwayman of some sort and was displayed at both the Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition and the San Francisco Panama–Pacific International Exposition, as well as sideshows and carnivals.

Between and he was subjected to modern forensics in an attempt to figure out just who he was, but this resulted in more questions than answers. The most intriguing thing may be the shotgun pellets embedded in his head, which you can see if you look closely at the mummy.

Apparently, they were not what killed him as they had time to heal over, leaving his actual cause of death as much of a mystery as his identity. Hanging from the rafters near the front of the shop is a blackened and grimacing Fiji Mermaid.

No one seems to know the provenance of this particular item, although the original proprietor told colorful stories about it being shot "off the shores of Duckabush" by a local fisherman.

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