In 1968, John Milkovisch was just another retired employee of Southern Pacific railroad. He lived in an undistinguished house in an undistinguished suburban neighborhood of Houston. Then John got antsy. He began decorating his patio with pieces of brass, marbles, rocks and buttons. Then he tore up the lawn and replaced it with similar glittery debris. The house itself was next. John took beer cans and flattened them into aluminum siding
Beer cans quickly became John's exclusive medium -- a convenient one, since John drank a lot of beer. He worked on the house for the next 18 years, incorporating a six-pack a day into its adornment -- roughly 39,000 cans. He linked pull-tabs into long streamers to make curtains that chimed when the wind blew. "This curtain idea is just one of those dreams in the back of my noodle," he explained at the time.
"John thought beer cured everything," explained Mary, his wife, after John had died.
John passed away several years ago but his Beer Can House is still intact. Mary is still here, too, and welcomes visitors. The cans are a record of John's imbibing preferences -- Coors cylinders are sculpted into whirligigs, while long rows of Texas Pride and various Lite beers make up the walls. Pull tabs tinkle lightly in the breeze, but the only belches you'll hear are your own.
March 2008: The restoration is complete and the Beer Can House will open to the public with regular weekend hours starting March 8, 2008.
March 2005: The Orange Show Foundation has landed a $125,000 Houston Endowment grant to repair and restore the Beer Can home of John Milkovisch.
May 2002: Mary passed away in March 2002. In November 2001, when Mary could no longer live without assistance, the Orange Show Foundation and its army of folk art preservationists purchased the property. According to an Orange Show Foundation spokesperson: "We are currently in the assessment stages of our conservation effort. The plans are to preserve the house for future generations and convert the interior into a public exhibition space to tell John Milkovisch's and the house's story. We also hope to have space for traveling folk art exhibitions."
"Until that transformation can take place, the house is not open to the public. Folks can always drive by and see plenty from the street, just as always. A dear friend of The Orange Show and an accomplished metal artist is living in the house now as caretaker."
