The City Museum: St. Louis' answer for the inner child in everyone
By: Lindsay Reber
Issue date: 3/17/04 Section: Culture
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There's something magical brewing behind sculpted serpents guarding the gates of 701 N. 15th Street in downtown St. Louis. It's a place where kids can go nuts and where adults can pretend they're kids again. A former shoe factory now houses the ultimate interactive art-playground experience - the City Museum. It's a blend of art, chaos, bruises and a whole lot of fun.
Looking at the City Museum from the outside, there's a school bus perched on top of the building. On the ground there's MonstroCity. It has a castle tower, a fire engine, a Thunderdome reminiscent of "Mad Max" and two airplane hulls suspended in the air. All of these elements are connected by a mad mess of bending, swirling and twisting wrought-iron slinkies. And amongst all these structures, people are climbing and crawling around.
"Our goal is to reawaken the childlike sense of wonder in all of us - transforming the way we look at the world," said Anthony Luster, house manager of the museum.
The creative vision for the museum came from sculptor and creative director of the museum, Bob Cassilly, who also created Turtle Park on Highway 40 next to Forest Park. Luster said that Cassilly's childhood memories and fantasies of "magical forests, caves, secret passages and a love of reptilian creatures provided the inspiration" for the museum.
The museum has served as one of the few attractions to downtown St. Louis. It opened in 1997 when, as Luster said, "the city was questioning the viability of the downtown."
"The opening of the City Museum was a bold move because of its unique collection of talent and because it served as a spark of revitalization for the city," Luster said.
Sara Oberst, a junior international studies major, thinks the museum is one of the only attractions downtown.
The museum is not only a playground to invite more people downtown, but it's also considered a piece of non-commercial art.
Laura Beckman, a senior sculpture and education major, works at Everydaycircus, which is a circus within the museum that visitors can participate in. Beckman said the museum is a "vibrant display of artist creation with a function," and like a collage of found objects.
"The City Museum is a big ol' piece of art," Oberst said.
Sonia Slankard, a senior art education major, works at Art City within the museum and said it's the "ultimate dumpster dive." According to Slankard, there's so much going on that people have to come a couple of times to take everything in.
"It's a living, breathing, crawling through, creating in and on, pulsating piece of art," she said.
At Art City, people of all ages can make tie-dyed shirts, decorative hats, make sculptures and create just about anything. It's Slankard's favorite place in the museum.
"It's dirty, real and you feel like you're part of art," Slankard said.
Just like there's always a new creation at Art City, the rest of the museum is constantly changing and evolving.
The museum began as a private collection of "fun, interesting sculptures and architectural fragments," according to Luster.
"Bob says one of the reasons why he constructed the City Museum was because he wanted somewhere to put all of his toys," Luster said.
A place that many of those toys have gone to is a café on the second floor of the museum, Beatnik Bob's. Bob's usually has movies playing. Sometimes Slankard goes over on her lunch break to smoke and watch cartoons.
Countless carnival-like displays are all throughout Bob's and the surrounding area. There are two Big Boy statues, an animatronic fortuneteller and many other interesting, random and wonderful objects to look at.
There's also an elaborate miniature train display for train enthusiasts to explore and take their own train ride through.
Exploring, crawling, climbing and creating are what the museum is all about. There are many different areas and creative places within the multi-story playground.
Inside, visitors can walk into the mouth of a whale and end up crawling into a treehouse-like upper level. Iron-sculpted slinkies big enough for people to crawl through wind all around the structures within the museum.
After making it all the way up to the third floor, people can ride down the slides both inside and outside the museum to get to the bottom.
"Those slides get you going at top speeds and I've literally torn the seat out of my pants at the bottom... not once, but twice," Beckman said.
Beckman warns visitors to remember to wear durable clothing when going to the museum for that exact reason.
Claustrophobia is a problem for Oberst, who is afraid of getting stuck in the covered slides.
There are also 10-story slides constructed from old shoe chutes already existing within the building. These extremely steep, iron bar-covered slides descend into the Enchanted Caves beneath the museum.
The caves occupy approximately 17,000 square feet underneath the 140,000 square foot multi-level playground above.
On the museum's Web site, Cassilly describes the caves as "a powerful symphony, fusing muse-like sculptures, petrified dragons, convoluted stairways and crystalline bodies into a fascinating cathedral of concrete."
Take a walk outside the craziness inside and visitors stumble into MonstroCity. The Thunderdome is where people can jump and climb up huge rubberbands made from surgical tubing, while a blanket of iron structures and crawl spaces floats above. An enclosed campfire is also outside where visitors can sit and talk while roasting marshmallows. Next to that is the Cabin Inn the City where visitors can buy a drink or two.
The museum has become a hangout, said Luster, especially for people after work or school.
During the day, it's mainly schoolchildren who go to the museum. Slankard said there can sometimes be more than 900 kids there at once.
"Every time I work I'll meet someone who's never been here, and they always say how this is the coolest place," she said.
At night, the museum turns into a social scene. Beckman likes to socialize with a group of diverse, fun people. The museum provides an alternative for minors, or for those who don't want to go out to bars in the first place.
"The fact that the City Museum is open on Friday and Saturday nights, has a bar and marshmallow roasting makes the kid and the adult mesh well together. I'm allowed to hang out around people my age, in a playful setting, but be taken seriously," Beckman said.
"A lot of fun freaks come out at night," Slankard said.
She mentioned that there were Furries, people who get their kicks out of dressing up in animal costumes, running around the museum because they were having a convention. There was also a separate night when a woman dressed up as a chicken was running through the museum. Besides wonderment of all the art within the museum, the people that visit are usually pretty interesting as well.
Slankard said people learn to be different at the museum, whether through art or just by the chilled out, fun and exciting atmosphere.
"The City Museum is the heart of the city. It's something created from nothing. It adds so much eclectic and eccentric interest to St. Louis," she said.
City Museum hours:
-Wed/Thurs. 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
-Fri. 9 a.m. - 1 a.m.
-Sat. 10 a.m. - 1 a.m.
-Sun. 10 a.m. - 1 a.m.
Closed Mon. and Tues.
Admission:
City Museum (ages 2+): $7.50
MonstroCity: add $2.50
Enchanted Caves add $5.00
*After 5 p.m. Fri - Sat.: $5.00,
MonstroCity included.
*For additional pricing, visit
www.citymuseum.org or call (314) 231-2489.
