Weird Homes

Some people just can’t relax when they retire. A retired engineer builds a full size operating rail road in his backyard. In a rural area near Oakland, California artist Karen Wyse works non-stop expanding her home and yard with her creations. And then there is the crusty old sea captain who lives in his own pirate’s den.

Folk artists seem naturally to use their homes and yards as a canvas for art. ‘Dick and Jane’s Spot’ in Ellensburg, Washington is a delightful world filled with this couple’s unique folk art. In the backwoods near Seale, Alabama, Butch Anthony treats us to his folk artist hideaway complete with decorated hearse and bottle trees.

An amazing undertaker’s home built out of 600,000 embalming fluid bottles. A beer can house in Houston, Texas and Moore’s Junk Castle in Pullman, Washington. Wonders created from trash.

Unique homes created as a result of personal suffering. The Button King in South Carolina has insomnia so he has taken to glue hundreds of thousands of buttons to his home, clothes and car. Ex-alcoholic, The Flowerman uses recycled junk to decorate his home and in Toronto, an injured mason has covered every square inch of his home with wooden screws.

In Bend, Oregon two delightful men have created a fantasy farm bursting with humour including a bowling ball garden and a love pond. And ‘Andy’s Dummy Farm’ in rural New Brunswick is littered with hundreds of life size dummies that all have a story to tell.

A decoration of homes to make a point. Pearl Fryar’s topiary garden in Bishopville, South Carolina brings a
message of love. ‘Richart’s Ruins’, in downtown Centralia, Washington takes teaching art to the outer limits and in
Alabama, a religious fanatic litters his acreage with crosses and old refrigerators painted with surreal messages.

For some, pink flamingoes is just the start. A visit to the famous home of Violis Simpson whose place is surrounded
by his amazing towering whirligigs. In Rosedale, Alberta we meet the charming folks who call their home
‘Rainbow Acres’.

Life-sized scarecrows, huge boulders and thousands of flowers. In Nova Scotia, the place is known as ‘Angela’s
Scarecrows’ and Angela talks to each and every one of these backyard creatures who have all become her friends.

An elderly farmer in Alberta enjoys life at his place he calls the ‘Nuthouse’, and for good reason. A black couple in
Mississippi show us around ‘Margaret’s Grocery’ and sing us a gospel song. ‘The House of Exotica’ in San
Francisco contains a lifetime collection of weird things from around the world.

Collecting is an obsession for some. ‘The House of Toys’ in Oakland, California is bursting with thousands of every toy you can imagine. Another California home contains a grotto where the walls are completely covered with stuff collected from garage sales.

These folks look at junk with a very different eye. Remarkable recycled art from trash. Sites from rural British Columbia to Kosciucko, Mississippi and including ‘Rodeen’s Metalworks’ in Kennewick, Washington.

Three truly amazing places. A man-made and totally painted mountain in the desert, a strange temple in the backwoods of Georgia, and an underground home in Ontario whose owner loves to fly with geese over his farm in his home-built ultra-light.

From Port Costa, California to Fanny Bay, British Columbia. Life-sized robots, metal dogs and the odd cyclops in the garden have all been created and given homes by these three extraordinary artists.