Among the items lost in the devastating Eaton fire was the Bunny Museum and Candice Frazee and Steve Lubansky’s epic ode to the world’s hoppiest animal, the rabbit. The Altadena Museum on Lake Avenue was one of Los Angeles’ quintessentially quirky institutions, a place that transported guests to a strange and magical world where bunnies pervaded every aspect of life.
It includes stuffed rabbits (including the first rabbit Lubansky gave Frazee, a rabbit he gave her because they affectionately called each other “Bunny”), hundreds of miniature Porcelain rabbit, rabbit t-shirt collection, bunny cookie jar, bag Bunny movie posters (including Who Made Roger Rabbit and Peter Rabbit), Bunny Song Room (Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit, etc.), Bunny Costumes, Bunny Books, Rose Parade Float bunny items and more.
The couple ended up amassing a total of more than 46,000 rabbit objects and memorabilia. This was recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s largest rabbit collection.
The Rabbit Museum, photographed before the fire, had the world’s largest collection of rabbits.
(Maxwell Williams/Los Angeles Times)
Much of it was destroyed in Wednesday’s fire. Frazee also lost her cellphone in the fire, and “lost my wedding album, wedding dress, and 46,000 rabbit objects,” she wrote in an email from the motel.
It’s been a lifetime’s work, and Lubansky stood outside the building next door and hosed it down until the building next door caught fire. That’s when the couple grabbed some carefully selected rabbit items, real rabbits Doris and Nicky, and their cat, and left.
“We rescued the first rabbit and the second rabbit in the collection,” Frazee said. “Gifts for each other. We saved antiques, three framed Guinness World Record certificates, and an Elvis parsley jug. We kept our wedding album, wedding dress, and 46,000 bunny objects. I lost it.”
She added: “Today is not a hoppy day.”
But on Thursday, Frazee vowed to fans on social media that he would rebuild a bunny museum in the same space if possible. She said the museum has not yet set up a GoFundMe, but is planning one, and said the current fundraiser is not sanctioned by the Bunny Museum.
The Bunny Museum began in 1998 as a modest initiative. Frazee and Lubansky have been collecting bunnies since their first museum and had amassed enough to open their first location in their Pasadena home to the public by appointment. It was strange at the time, but people came. They told friends about this strange collection of rabbit goods, and the collection grew until, in 2017, the Rabbit Museum expanded to Altadena, filling a 7,000-square-foot mid-century building with bunnies.
As Frazee told almost everyone who entered, it was “the most fun place on earth.”
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