{"id":23018,"date":"2023-06-16T19:33:21","date_gmt":"2023-06-16T23:33:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=23018"},"modified":"2023-06-16T19:34:03","modified_gmt":"2023-06-16T23:34:03","slug":"mirror-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2023\/06\/16\/mirror-house\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Prekop\u2019s Mirror House Is For Sale<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The problem was the view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you looked out the bathroom window, you looked onto a brick wall,\u201d the artist Martin Prekop<\/a> tells me. \u201cThere was a beautiful wood behind it, but you couldn\u2019t see it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So he began covering that wall outside the main bedroom\u2019s bathroom at the right rear of the house with mirrors that he custom cut to 2 inches wide by 8 inches long to match the size of the exterior bricks. Then he added more mirrors to the exterior of the house. And more mirrors. And more mirrors. Thousands of them. Until he\u2019d covered nearly the whole exterior of the brown brick, split-level ranch house house at 897 Field Club Road in Pittsburgh\u2019s leafy upscale Fox Chapel neighborhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“You never know how many bricks your home is made up of until you decide to put mirrors on every one,” Prekop joked to a gathering of Mattress Factory members<\/a> at the house in 2016. \u201cIt is like an art project that never ends.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Deck
Deck at back of Martin Prekop’s Mirror House, Pittsburgh. (Sotheby’s International Realty)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Prekop tells me, \u201cIt took maybe 15 years total time to cover it.\u201d The home became known as the Mirror House. (Though Prekop says, \u201cI never called it anything.\u201d) Having the mirrors follow the grid of the bricks gave the dazzling shimmer an underling sense of careful order. The house appears both bejeweled and as if it\u2019s disappearing into the surrounding greenery. Sometimes it feels as if the house is watching you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe get notes in our mailbox all the time from kids saying they love the house and their father hates it,\u201d Prekop told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in<\/a> April 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMost often I hear the shocking statement that no one would ever buy this place because of what I\u2019ve done to it,\u201d Prekop told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in 1998. \u201cAs if I wanted to sell it! We\u2019re not planning on leaving.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Prekop retired in 2018 after years of teaching art and leading colleges, and is aiming to move closer to his grown children and grandkids. So this spring, he has put the Mirror House up for sale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n