For the average Florida tourist, the only castle on the peninsula belongs to Cinderella. Roughly a hundred miles from the calculated splendor of Disney World, off unpaved country roads, past a group of vultures snacking on a deer carcass, where cell reception goes black, is another palace, made entirely from repurposed junk.
To twist the old adage, one man’s trash is definitely still another man’s treasure - bringing us to Solomon’s Castle, one of the places that helped inspire the American Weirdness project back in the autumn of 2012.
Howard Solomon is the king of this castle, though he opts for a skipper’s hat rather than a crown. He moved to the central Florida property in 1972, having bought it on the cheap. With the first late-summer rains, Solomon realized he had scored a massive deal on acres of mosquito-infested swampland. He began construction on his regal residence that year, transforming the waterlogged acres into a recycled wonderland. It withstood hurricanes Charley, Jeanne, and Frances, which all tore through Ona, ripping out groves of old oak trees but leaving the castle unharmed. Now in his late 70’s, Solomon presides over a massive kingdom, one both unique and ever-expanding.
The castle features over 90 hand-made, stained-glass windows, depicting images of nursery rhymes, zodiac symbols, and the planets. The exterior panels are made of a holographic metal that changes colors in the sunlight. A black and white knight stand watch at either side of the entrance - Knight and Day.
While serving as a residence for Solomon and his wife, the castle is also a museum of his artwork, crafted entirely from found objects. He has used oil drums, beer cans, and failed appliances, even re-appropriating the cylinder of a Volkswagen Beetle into one of his sculptures. He made a menagerie of animals out of coat hangers, weighing nearly 50 pounds, and has crafted over 300 cars out of beer cans, the only project he says he doesn’t remember making. It took him over a year to gather the parts to create a steam engine that runs on a working Hoover vacuum motor. He made a carousel from old record players, complete with singing figurines in the style of “It’s a Small World After All.”
Our tour guide, a Vietnam War veteran, blessed with the quick rap of a vaudeville performer, took every opportunity to crack jokes about the sculptures and their pun-filled monikers. He stopped beside a six-foot-long metal Lion named Lionel, quipping “Lionel has two glass eyes and two steal balls.” The “Lorena Bobbitt” shotgun has a knife attached, to keep fidelity in check, and the “Mother-in-Law” clock, which runs backwards with the three on the left and the nine on the right.
Between 1990 and 1994, Solomon built the Boat in the Moat, called the Santa Maria, a restaurant run by Princess Solomon and her husband that serves country-style lunch fare. Two years ago, Solomon created the Alashmo, his version of the Alamo, right next door to his daughters home, which he also built himself, a deep brown stucco structure called The Chocolate House.
 |
| Remember the Alashmo. |
 |
| Lunch like a pirate. |
King Solomon is never far from his castle, greeting visitors with a lissome grin and taking their tickets. It took a few minutes for us to even realize that he was the Solomon of Solomon’s Castle, taking a Saturday off from his workshop on the premises to man the register.
Solomon’s Castle is one of the most interesting pieces of living art in the cultural wasteland of Florida, made by a true, original Dadaist. If you’re not in love with paying $100 for the screaming, vomiting experience of Disney World to stand inside a castle, drive the 90 minutes to Ona to visit one created by a real artist for a mere $10.
Despite his age, Solomon assured that he plans to keep expanding and creating so long as he’s able.
“Some day,” he said. “The castle will be my kids problem.”
No comments:
Post a Comment