Darla Adlar Sibylla was one of the youngest Sybilla siblings and from an early age she tagged along on many of her older brothers’ and sisters’ incredible adventures. On these voyages she amassed many small trinkets and treasures, and sketched detailed observations of the curiosities she came across. This was the beginning of her personal collection. As she grew older, she struck out on her own expeditions to even more remote jungles, uncharted islands and places we can only attempt to imagine, all the while adding to her cabinet of curiosities.

Darla was insatiably curious. Inspired by her siblings’ vastly varied interests, she was fascinated by anything and everything she could view through her magnifying glass. Some say she was prone to daydreams and flights of fancy, but we observe in her cabinet the studies of a polymath: she was clearly knowledgeable in many different subjects. Her cabinet contains a dazzling variety of both natural and unnatural curiosities. It contains creatures both known and unknown, both familiar and the stuff of myths and legends.

Darla is said to have always kept a mirror and a magnifying glass in her pocket to help her see things from different angles and perspectives. She appears to have written some of her scientific observations in a mirror language, possibly going as far as coding secret messages in anagrams to reward the keenest of sleuths. Even her name–Dara Adlar–is an anagram. (Anagrams are words that contain the same letters arranged in a different order.) Our scientists are working diligently to decipher her writings and the origins of the specimens on display but as yet they have been unsuccessful.