All the Beauty in the World

Millions of people climb the grand marble staircase into New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art every year. But only a select few have unrestricted access to every nook and cranny.

They’re the guards in dark blue suits, keeping careful watch over this vast treasure house. Caught up in the early days of a glamorous journalism career, Patrick Bringley never thought he’d be one of them. Then his brother was diagnosed with fatal cancer and he needed to escape the mundane clamour of daily life. So he quit, and sought solace in the most beautiful place he knew.

To his surprise, this temporary refuge becomes his home away from home for a decade. We follow him as he guards delicate treasures from Egypt to Rome, strolls the labyrinths beneath the galleries, and discovers how restorative art can be.

Bringley enters the museum as a ghost, silent and almost invisible, but soon finds his voice and place amongst the lively subculture of museum guards. As his bonds with colleagues and the artwork grow, he learns how fortunate he is to be walled off in this little world and how much it resembles the best aspects of the larger world to which he gradually, gratefully returns.

All the Beauty in the World is a moving, revelatory portrait of one of the world’s great museums and its treasures by someone whose value is often overlooked: the museum guard.