Rougemont Castle

"The Castle" is slowly reaching up to the sky on Red Mountain in Rougemont, North Carolina. The small-scale Castle will be sheathed in white marble and cream-colored North Carolina stone. A great part of the interior space is devoted to sculpture studios, painting studios, and foundry. The design and the construction is taking place simultaneously. It's a great creative experience! The Castle will function as a gallery, studio, home and canvas for many years to come. This residence is being built by marble sculptor, Robert Mihaly.

Small Palace

For some reason, Robert Mihaly didn't think the castle would be a big deal. Eight years after he started work on the place, he's still surprised when visitors, usually complete strangers, appear at the top of the unpaved driveway with their jaws agape. They are staring at a small palace, complete with oxidized copper cupolas, spires, oddly shaped windows and the beginnings of a moat -- in Rougemont, no less. "I swear when I built this place it didn't occur to me that people would show up," he said. Mihaly, a self-taught sculptor whose patrons include John Edwards, the state of Virginia and Duke University, also taught himself how to build a castle. After reading up on local zoning requirements and house design, Mihaly set to work. With the help of a few friends, climbing gear from REI, the occasional rental of a crane and a healthy amount of naivete, he has constructed a four-story building that rivals anything out of The Brothers Grimm. "It slowly got more and more ridiculous," he said. "The view was just so nice." Nothing like it This is not the first time Mihaly has taken on a seemingly impossible idea and brought something to life, though the castle is hardly finished. The inside has only one completed room -- a studio-like space with an arched, cathedral ceiling covered in dark woodwork, a wooden floor with paths of small, earthy granite tiles and large, dark marble winding through it, wall-to-wall books, a Victrola, dead ficus and a long-abandoned lofted bed. He lived there on and off while building the castle, but now lives with his family in northern Durham. The rest of the home is mainly framing, an unfinished spiral staircase leading to an even less finished third floor. There are the beginnings of a wine press next to a catwalk on the second level and on the bottom floor a robotic paint sprayer he occasionally plays with. Many birds have built their homes within the fortress, and Mihaly has gone so far as to cover the concrete floor below with hay should the babies fall from the nest.

The recent addition of a baby into his own life has helped refuel his desire to finish this project. After working on it for four years, then letting it languish another four, he is ready again to complete the inside of the building and start landscaping a proper, castle-worthy yard. He would like his 6-month-old daughter, Chlo' Chrysanthemum, to enjoy the house before fairy tales lose their appeal.

Unlikely career

Mihaly's career has centered on transforming chunks of stone into works of art -- a craft most would consider more suited to weekend hobbying. Certainly not something to base a career on, especially with no formal training. But that is exactly what Mihaly has done. After leaving Ohio's Kent State University just a few weeks into his freshman year (he followed a girl to Greenville, N.C., he said), Mihaly, now 40, scrounged up work doing designs for restaurants in the form of glass etching. He knocked on the doors of architects and got jobs by showing photos of the work he'd done in high school. At 21, a house designer showed him a picture of a Renaissance villa and asked if he'd be able to recreate that style out of stone to decorate a client's house in Raleigh. Even though he had no previous experience working with rock, Mihaly said yes. About 18 months and four tractor-trailer loads of Indiana limestone later, he was officially a sculptor. "I just sort of kept my chisel to the stone," he said. "I have this notion that people can do anything." He, at least, seems to be able to do anything he puts his mind to, even though he says he usually takes the longest, hardest route. He's always up for a challenge -- he doesn't want to do it unless it's going to be difficult, he joked. One has to wonder, though, looking at the creation that sits near the very top of Red Mountain in far northern Durham County. He says he has taught himself to do most things by reading as much as he can before letting trial and error play themselves out. However, it is hard to believe one man could put something so amazing into the side of a hill without more help. Ralph Falls of Raleigh trusted Mihaly to adorn the grave of his beloved father after reading about Mihaly's work as an Artist in Residence at the Washington National Cathedral. They for years about doing a project before he made up his mind on the reproduction of a crypt he discovered along the English-Scottish border. "Even though he has no degree, his education is about as broad as anyone I've ever known," Falls said. "He's understated, which I guess is one of the reasons he's so appealing to me." Mihaly is now working on a second commission for Falls that in the end will serve as two fireplaces made from Indiana limestone. The indoor side will be heaven, the other side hell, which will face outdoors. He has looked to Dante and Rodin for inspiration in crafting the heavenly bodies and rays of light that he's done so far on the heaven side. The romance of the Old World calls to him, as does the challenge of turning stone into art.

He can be found most days during the week at the top of Red Mountain, chiseling away at rock just outside the castle he's decided to call Mont Rouge.

Elizabeth Shestak, Correspondent