While driving through Charlevoix on our fall road trip through Michigan, I spotted this incredibly gorgeous, yet odd house. "Did you see that house!?" I asked Jason. He's my personal chauffeur (simply because I am the world's worst driver) so he tends to miss a few sites while driving me around.
"No. Do I need to go back and look?"
"Hell, Yes!"
Built in 1918 by Earl Young, this house was designed to look like a mushroom. Apparently Earl had an odd obsession with boulders and ended up designing quite a few "mushroom houses" in Charlevoix with the boulders he collected. We noticed that you could go on tours every weekday, but since this was a find that we magically stumbled upon, we didn't budget time for any touring. So, I am not going to go into the history of these homes since I'm not educated on them at all, but you can find more information about the designer and his houses here.
Stumbling on these mushroom houses while out hunting for fall colors in Michigan was a happy little accident. If we're ever up that way again, I'd really like to book a stay at The Thatch House and maybe actually do the tour of the rest of the homes. There are 28 in all, so we missed seeing a good chunk of them on our own. If you don't want to book a tour for yourself, you can download the map for the self guided tour HERE.
Have you ever stumbled upon something unique and unexpected while road tripping?
They are so crazy cute! I bet Smurfs live in them! So you can actually tour them inside too? Being a poor country war ridden for centuries, we don't really have cute houses beside the city centre palaces, all our houses are simplistic and ugly, I do like the English way of building. Ours don't go for beautiful but just for practical, sadly, as we have no monies for architects. My own houses is probably more unique than others as we have a glass tower from the yard, but the public does not see it as it is in the backyard side where our steps go to the upper floor.
ReplyDeleteThe first one I believe you can rent, or it might be a bed and breakfast. The others are private homes, though. But, you can go on a guided tour of the route where you'll learn about each house.
DeleteWhat is a glass tower you can see from your yard? Like a big glass building?
No, one side of our house has a staircase to the upper floor which is surrounded by a tower made of glass bricks, so it looks like a little tower from the backyard perspective. You cannot even see it on Google maps, just the ugly front of our house shot a few years ago when it was still not painted, methinks. From the front our house actually looks really small and everybody gets surprised when they enter and see all the stairs and three levels (basement, first floor and upper floor). Everything is hidden under the roof.
DeleteOh, I see. It sounds quite interesting, that staircase of yours. Google should really think about updating their maps. The ugly RV is gone next door and when we eventually sell this house, I don't want people seeing that eyesore on the maps and think that's what they'll have to live next to. But, in all fairness, it does make an appearance in the summer months when they come back to visit their family, so I suppose it is there for a short period each year.
DeleteHow completely enchanting are those houses? I would love to do a walking tour of that area. It looks amazing. I’m sure that the homeowners have the money to pay for some fabulous landscaping as well!
ReplyDeleteOne of our unexpected finds was when we were driving from Utah south to Monument Valley, following our paper MapQuest print outs in 2010. We had no idea what we were in for . . . Moki Dugway! It’s an unpaved series of switchbacks and considered one of the most dangerous roads in America. Lol, I actually didn’t think it was as bad as Chief Joseph Scenic Highway in Wyoming. We’ve done a lot of driving out west.
Leave it to good old MapQuest to give you an adventure you'd never forget LOL. I'd love to do more road trips out west. Hopefully we'll all be able to safely travel again soon.
DeleteI love them. They're so cute.
ReplyDeleteLike little fairy tale cottages in a Disney film!
DeleteSuch a great place; I like how unique these houses are. :)
ReplyDelete♡ ☯ ☮ P&P style ☮ ☯ ♡
Those houses are super cool! Love the look of all of them.
ReplyDeleteAren't they amazing!?
DeleteI really want to live in a mushroom house now!! I love how Jason turned around without much thought. My husband would have made me literally beg and then tease me for a week about "the mushroom houses".. LOL Too bad you didn't do the tour because that sounded very interesting. Are people living in that home or were you able to go inside during the tour? Idk why, but I immediately pictured mushroom chairs and a mushroom toilet in the interior. (Maybe I need to stop playing with my daughter's Tinker Bell set.)
ReplyDeleteWhen driving out east, we'll purposely try to get lost and stumble across fun things. We almost always stumble across a little beach or a giant mansion that makes me wonder which celebrity is inside. :)
I believe the first one is a bed and breakfast, though there is a sign out front that says private residence. However, the website says it is available to rent.
DeleteHe only turned around because we didn't have any specific destination in mind. If we were actually en route somewhere, I would have had to pull teeth to get him to turn around.
I like the idea of purposely getting lost. You find the best things on the roads less traveled. I was pissed when we stuck to the major highways in Ireland. I had to tell Jason to start taking back roads. I wanted to see REAL Ireland. Not Ireland from the major highway.
Wow. Now they sure are some of the most unique houses I've seen, and I've seen a lot of friggin houses. From murder shacks to eye sores lol Sure be neat to live in one of them.
ReplyDeleteWe have a place here nicknamed Smurf Village because the houses are built in a hill, but they are just normal looking houses.
Those houses are cool! I can't think of anything right off. BUT I know there are things I happened upon. I know on some vacays we didn't plan on going to certain places, ended up doing so and they were the best things we saw.
ReplyDeleteHa now those are cool houses. I wonder what they look like inside and if decorating is fun or a nightmare!! I think I'd surely love to try!
ReplyDeleteWhat creative and captivating houses these are.True works of art!
ReplyDelete