the city museum.

What looks at first to be a construction site/obvious death-trap-for-kids

is the coolest playground EVER.

While home for the holidays, Patrick and I went on a little adventure to the City Museum. What’s that, you ask? a Dr. Seuss-Moustrap game. a ride down the rabbit hole. and the brain child of artist/sculptor Bob Cassilly.

I remember visiting in ’97 when it first opened and hearing about how Cassilly got the idea during his “mid-life crisis time” when driving past the old Brown Shoe Company Building that was for sale. Yeah, right–of course it would make an AWESOME artists’/kids’ playground! But who would actually do it? Cassilly.

He started by collecting TONS (literally) of free ‘junk’ (like old tile and watch bands for mosaic-ing, abandoned planes and school buses, bottles, marble steps, store fronts, cafeteria serving dishes, loads of metal, and other discarded, worthless stuff), and then began creating the funnest, man-made place on earth. Amusement parks have nothing on him.

An enormous praying mantis climbs up the side of the building, and a school bus dangles off the roof. Inside, you can slide down a long neck dinosaur while spinning painted cylinders into a roar. You can climb thru metal cage-like tunnels high in the air, walk on a mosaic ocean that you wish was the floor of your house, see a baby alien-Elvis or have a fancy root-beer float in a hippie saloon. You can watch the art of glass-blowing, ride a train, see a circus act or gawk at the new aquarium. You can make art or shop at the retro thrift store. But the coolest part is the 2 dark cave sections! (Get out your night vision!) They added 4 stories of cave exploration in the past 2 years equipped with a 4-story spiral slide that you think will surely never end. (It was inspired by the shoe shute from the old factory.) After it’s finished, it will be TEN-stories, and then it’ll be rockin’ beyond your wildest slide imaginations! The building is 600,000 square ft, so there is plenty of room to grow–can you immagine?? And, did I mention the outdoor playground??

Ok, so initially we thought we should take one of our nieces or nephews, but they were all either too young or “unavailable”. Then we thought we’d just call out my nephew Jake’s name as if we were looking for him as we were climbing, crawling and sliding throughout the museum, but alas, there was no need. We just jumped right in and played. I am positively sure now that sliding on slides makes me laugh more than anything in this world.

Find a way to road trip it to St. Louis. You’ll love it.

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