Various movies, books and cartoons romanticized living in a castle and that would be many kids’ dream to live in one. Some adults may think so too because they also know about what kind of lifestyle is associated with it. However, the reality of living in a castle is very different as many of them are really old, need renovations and modernization.
That is why some people who have enough money build their own dream castles with all the commodities that modern times offer and with even more features that the old ones don’t have, like a cinema room or a golf field.
If you go to look through the listings of houses, you might not find a castle that easily, but they are definitely there. Twitter user Rebecca Makkai actually came across one and its interior and exterior are so unusual, the owner’s story is so crazy, and it can be rented for unusual events, so it caught her eye.
Twitter user Rebecca Makkai shared an unusual property listing she found and it was an actual castle
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Rebecca Makkai is a writer from Chicago and on her Twitter, she shared a long thread of pictures of Christopher Mark’s castle with a moat surrounding it with some interesting facts about the place and the owner taking advantage of her talent to make it an interesting read.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
It is a modern-day castle, built in 2010 and it resembles a Disney one but a little bit more creepy and less magical
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
The castle was built in 2010 by Christopher Mark, the grandson of Chicago steel tycoon Clayton Mark who was one of the pioneer makers of steel pipe in the US. It is located in Connecticut, around 40 miles from Hartford.
It looks quite fairy tale-like, something similar to what can be seen in Disney movies about princesses and it’s not a coincidence as Christopher Mark dedicated this castle to his daughters who liked to dress up as if they were part of a royal family.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
The castle is currently owned by Christopher Mark, who had it built for his daughters and he is now selling it for $60M
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
The property with the land surrounding the castle covers 75 acres and the castle has 18,777 square feet (1744 square meters) of living space with 9 bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, 12 fireplaces, an underground garage, seven floors and an elevator. There are secret passageways, a dungeon and a moat. The castle is surrounded by a pond, so why not take advantage of it and dig a ditch? On the ground floor, there is a home theatre and complete performing arts stage.
The construction on the castle began back in 2003 and cost $4,100,000. It was a long project and more than 100 artisans from all over the world got involved in it. The wooden doors you see in the pictures were actually hand-carved by a local Connecticut boat builder. Although the style may not be everyone's favorite, but the construction and the designing of the castle required a lot of effort and time.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
It has 10 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, 12 fireplaces, 7 floors, an elevator, a performance stage and many other crazy features
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
It was first listed for sale in 2014 for $45,000,000 and the price changed a couple of times but nobody bought the castle and in 2016 the listing was removed. In June of last year, it reappeared again and the price was $35,000,000, which is $3,000,000 more than before removing the advertisement. Interestingly, a few days ago, on 23 of January, the price had a drastic jump to $60,000,000.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Even though the style is not Rebecca's cup of tea, there was a lot of effort put into the construction and design of the castle as over 100 artisans worked on it
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Both the exterior and interior of the castle are really eccentric, extravagant and just over the top, so the buyer must have a specific taste, but they must also have some spare millions in their bank account. It's definitely not a traditional family house.
Rebecca, who posted the thread, seems to not be very fond of the decisions that were made to pull everything together. She points out that there are quite a lot of clocks inside that may be there to remind people that time is what is killing us, unless the moat will be useless and the Visigoths will do that first.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Not only did Rebecca talk about the arrangement of the rooms, she gave some interesting facts about the owner's life
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
She draws our attention to a room that you could say is eclectic as it features some branches that might allude to an enchanted forest from the above-mentioned fairy tales about princesses right by the flat-screen TV and above the marble floors.
The dining room is, for some reason, guarded by suits of armor and the nearby room is decorated with two elephant statues looking down to a family crest integrated in the wooden floor.
Christopher Mark is the great-grandson of Clayton Mark who started using steel for pipes
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Christopher didn't live in the castle with his family for too long as his wife filed for divorce
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Another weirdly arranged part of the house is the kitchen, which is round and has a column in the middle of it with storage space for spices.
Rebbeca’s favorite part is what seems to be an office space where the different-sized chairs just make sense.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
He then invited his girlfriend to live with him but when she gave birth to their child, Christopher broke up with her over text
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
The writer continues her engaging story to talk about what happened to the castle after it was built. Turns out, Christopher Mark lived there with his wife Mary Galt and two daughters, but she filed for divorce and left.
Then he invited his now ex-girlfriend Marina Isakova to the castle, who left her husband and took her daughter with her to live with him. After she gave birth to Christopher’s daughter, she was reportedly banned from the castle. What is more, Christopher refused to pay more than a required minimum for the child support, so Marina had to live off food stamps.
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
What is more, he refused to pay more than the minimum required childcare and he was allegedly involved in the starving of a camel
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Another scandal surrounding the castle was a dead camel. So the castle had a zoo and it was called Wilderness Kingdom, Inc. Besides the camel, the zoo once housed an emu and a zebra. During the divorce litigations between Chrostopher and his wife, Mary, they both accused one another of starving the camel to death.
Despite the family drama attached to the castle, even though it hasn’t been sold yet, it hasn’t stayed empty all that time. It has held events like music performances and weddings and it was involved in the making of the 2020 Hallmark movie One Royal Holiday.
As nobody has purchased the castle, it was repurposed for various events and a movie was filmed in it
Image credits: rebeccamakkai
Image credits: ErinEdw78312460
The castle leaves quite an impression; it is for you to decide if it is a good or a bad one. We would like to hear if you would live there if you had the money. What is your favorite and least favorite part of it and why do you think it is still on the market?