The Bunny Museum, destroyed by Eaton fire, vows to return

Among the many losses within the devastating Eaton hearth was the Bunny Museum, husband-and-wife Candace Frazee and Steve Lubanski’s grand ode to the world’s hoppiest animal, the rabbit. The Altadena museum, positioned on Lake Avenue, was certainly one of L.A.’s quintessentially quirky establishments, a spot that transported visitors to a wierd and magical world the place the bunny permeates all facets of life.

There have been stuffed bunnies (together with the primary bunny that Lubanski gave to Frazee, the one which he gave to her as a result of they used to name one another “bunny” as an endearment), tons of of miniature porcelain bunnies, a bunny T-shirt assortment, bunny cookie jars, bunny film posters (together with “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” and “Peter Rabbit”), a bunny track room (Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit” for one), bunny costumes, bunny books, bunny gadgets from Rose Parade floats, and on and on.

The couple ended up gathering greater than 46,000 bunny objects and memorabilia in all — an authorized Guinness World Document for largest bunny assortment on this planet.

Most of it burned within the hearth on Wednesday. “We misplaced our wedding ceremony albums, my wedding ceremony gown, and 46,000 bunny objects,” Frazee wrote in an e mail from a motel, as her cellphone was additionally misplaced within the hearth.

It was a life’s work, and Lubanski stood outdoors the constructing hosing it down till the constructing subsequent door caught hearth. It was then that the couple grabbed a couple of choose bunny gadgets, their actual bunnies Doris and Nicky and their cats, and left.

“We saved the primary bunny and the second bunny of the gathering,” Frazee stated. “Items to one another. We saved the antiquity gadgets, three framed Guinness World Document certificates and the Elvis Parsley water pitcher. We misplaced our wedding ceremony albums, my wedding ceremony gown and 46,000 bunny objects.”

She added, “It’s not a hoppy day.”

However on Thursday, Frazee vowed to followers on social media that the Bunny Museum will rebuild, hopefully in the identical area. She stated the museum has but to arrange a GoFundMe, although they plan to, and that any present fundraising efforts floating round are usually not sanctioned by the Bunny Museum.

The Bunny Museum started as a humble endeavor again in 1998. Frazee and Lubanski had been gathering bunnies since that first one, and so they had sufficient of their arsenal to open the primary location, of their Pasadena house, to the general public on appointment. It was an oddity again then, however individuals got here. They instructed their mates about this unusual assortment of bunny gadgets, and the gathering grew, and eventually, in 2017, the Bunny Museum expanded to Altadena, to the 7,000-square foot midcentury constructing that they proceeded to stuff to the brim with bunnies.

As Frazee used to inform almost everybody that entered, it was the “hoppiest place on Earth.”