CASTLE VON FRANDSEN


I received E-Mail that said:

There is a castle being built high on a cliff over looking Lake Pend Oreille in Northern Idaho. There will be two massive towers, a great hall, two drawbridges each with double portcullis, and many smaller towers. Being built in an authentic Edwardian style.

Most of the summer was spent building a tunnel through the rock to the lake below.The time? Eighty hours per week on the hard rock pile. So much fun that the hours just fly by when you are there working on the castle.

The site is a giant chunk of granite and basalt, but we were able to find fractures and slice our way through following the cracks. It took two months to build the tunnel rock work after spending a month hammering on the rock to get the channel through. (We cheated here and used an excavator with a large hammer attachment) The tunnel is fifty feet long with a continuous arched ceiling. Built the CastleMagic way with waterproof insulation inside of the rock layers.. By the time the middle of November rolled around, we all collapsed and decided to call it quits for the winter. Not a bad summer and fall for two masons and a helper!

On 9-8-09, I received e-mail that said:

Castle Chalon has been renamed to Castle Von Frandsen. Here is a photo of the dining room under construction: {See second photo above}
The castle is being built using granite. Stone corbels will support the circular arched beam ceiling.

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Photos courtesy of Roger Greim.