Somewhere between a huge funhouse, playground and circus, the City Museum of St. Louis may be the most entertaining and interactive urban architectural experiment in the world. And if you are not having a good time, you can always hop on the 10-story slide, a remnant of the structure’s days as a shoe factory (originally designed to send products down the side of the building).

Eclectic from its stylings to its offerings, this unique place features everything from recycled buses and airplanes to giant multi-story slides and artificial caverns as well as more conventional kid-friendly fun in the form of skate parks and ball pits.

Various other imported, salvaged and upcycled oddities can be found throughout, including a vault and safety deposit boxes from a Chicago bank. And the place is constantly changing, being reconfigured and hacked away at by the Cassilly Crew.

What started inside of a derelict structure in the late 1990s has burst from the walls of the building, featuring an array of exterior ‘exhibits’ as well. Visitors can climb ramps, bridges and tunnels to access a high-hanging plane and other repurposed spaces. Up on the roof sits a small Ferris Wheel while a bus hangs over the edge of the building (and of course: people are welcome to climb inside).

The owners boast that they are “always building,” and Gallery Hip summarizes the strange paradoxes of this ever-changing place: “popular among residents and tourists, the museum bills itself as an ‘eclectic mixture of children’s playground, funhouse, surrealistic pavilion, and architectural marvel.’ Visitors are encouraged to feel, touch, climb on, and play in the various exhibits.” Or, as Colossal describes it: “hundreds of feet of tunnels that traverse from floor to floor, an aquarium, ball pits, a shoe lace factory, a circus arts facility, restaurants, and even a bar… because why not?”

Faced with this amazing place, one is left to wonder: would such an unusual endeavor be approved of were it being started from scratch today, or would safety-minded citizens suck the fun out before it got started? Like Adventure Playgrounds, also more popular in an era now past, it is hard to imagine this kind of project getting off the ground, but thankfully there is a precedent: it is hard to argue with the success of the City Museum.

The crowds have dispersed, the animal cages are empty and the striped Big Top is eerily silent… there’s no clowning around when the circus leaves town.

Moldering Away In Moldova

Say what you want about Soviet-era architecture but it wasn’t ALL atrocious, and this deserted circus arena in Chisinau, Moldova, still exudes a certain appeal a full ten years after it was abandoned. Constructed in 1981 and captured in its current state by Abandoned Journeys, the grandiose edifice straddles the last years of the USSR and the first years of Moldova, which gained its independence in 1991.

Freedom isn’t always free, however, and tough economic times in Moldova saw the circus shuttered in 2004. Nowadays it could pass for the decrepit, monumental, stair-terraced building that sheltered the childlike Eloi in the 1960 film The Time Machine.

Circus Minimus

Is it a circus, a cinema, a car park or a staging area for Gypsy caravans? Well, the owners are absent and the Gypsies aren’t talking so your guess is as good as ours. One thing we DO know is the location: La Linea, just across the border from Gibraltar in southern Spain, thanks to An Overland Adventure.

Worst Korea

Jeju, South Korea’s southernmost island province, recently made the news as the destination of the ill-fated MV Sewol ferry that sank with the tragic loss of hundreds of students in April of 2014. Jeju is less known as the site of an immense abandoned circus. Obviously deserted for more than a few years yet easily accessible to urban explorers including Great Big Scary World, the source of the above images and more, the circus must have been a popular tourist attraction in its heyday.

Wintercircus Of Our Discontent

The Wintercircus, located in Ghent, Belgium, was originally built in 1894. Devastated by fire in 1920, it was rebuilt and expanded three years later – the now Nouveau Cirque could hold up to 3,400 people! After the final circus performance in 1944, the building was used as a garage for the Mahy family’s extensive collection of classic automobiles until it once again closed – this time for good – in the late 1990s. Kudos to Archikey and photographer David for the exquisite image above.

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No Clowning Around 11 Sad Abandoned Circuses

In this strange circus performance piece, two travelers turn architectural conventions on end, moving an offbeat nomadic home through a comedic narrative via carefully choreographic actions. A bit of theater-to-go, The Wheelhouse features careworn gypsies, and revolves around homeless living but is bolstered by conceptual architecture and compelling acrobatics.

Per the video above and images below, this quite dynamic acting duo from the Acrojou Circus Theatre have taken their show quite literally on the road – audience members have to walk or ride alongside their curious portable stage, consisting of domestic essentials packed into a portable circle.

Doors, windows, furnishings and fixtures are all affixed to the inside of this unbalanced blend of off-kilter architecture and vertigo-inducing set design. Their half-hour performance consists of walking, sitting and laying down inside the circular structure as it winds its way down streets and sidewalks.

A hidden sound system provides the soundtrack for the piece, and the set itself can be deconstructed into three pieces – that bit is perhaps too bad: it would be neat were the rolling architecture a part of their traveling circus caravan.