The Happy Harper's: ~Solomon's Castle~

The other day we decided to visit Solomon's Castle in Ona, FL. The home and working studio of Mr Solomon is here. He is a well known sculptor and artist and we had a 1/2 hour tour of the museum - it was all so unique and very interesting.

Mr Solomon has been been sculpting and making different things since he was 4 years old!!! He is now 78. He does art work, metal and glasswork, woodwork and everything in between. He is an incredible artist with an extraordinary creative mind.

Everything on the property has a "story".

Everything he makes is from "junk" or "treasures" that he has found somewhere and his work is incredible. He has a very special talent.

These animals were made from coat hangers.

This train had a lampshade for the smokestack as well as a shock absorber for the driving piston and it actually ran on a vacuum cleaner's motor - amazing!!

This lion was made of bronze and then painted.

We had a private tour and our guide was so sweet to the kids. He made a joke out of everything he was describing!

He made several types of guns - this one was funny as he used a staple gun as the trigger and it shot forks as the bullets.

When he was 4 yrs old his mother gave him a razor blade (can you just imagine?) and told him to go outside and do something with it???? Anyhow.....that was the beginning of his creativeness as he came back inside with his first creation/invention - box at back on the left. The bowl in the front with the lid he made when he was 9 yrs old and has inlays in it - wow!

This is the "Boat in the Moat" restaurant. It took him 4 yrs to complete.

These are the "fencers" guarding the castle.

At the end of the tour we went for a walk around the castle and visited Mr Solomon's workshop - he just happened to be working on another project !!! We had a nice chat with him and he showed us some of his projects he was working on. It was so great for the kids to see this amazing artist in " real life" and to see someone still loving doing his "job".