A "frustrated club owner" embellishes his Pinellas Park home and now wants to share the amusement with guests.
By JADE JACKSON LLOYD
Published February 22, 2004
PINELLAS PARK - Bill Spencer lives in his dream home. Literally.
Spencer, 58, has seen everything in his and wife Miriam's abode in his sleep first. He just happens to dream in themes.
"Every spot in this house, I've literally dreamt or thought of," said the co-owner of Spencer's Western World, a local western apparel store. "I can't do anything if I haven't dreamt it."
With 22 rooms and a circular driveway, the roughly 6,000-square-foot home may seem like the average sprawling Florida home. Think again.
Consider the cherry red restored 1955 Chevy Bel Air that anchors the Rock 'n' Roll Fantasy room, a tribute to the '50s in everything from a working traffic light to the life-sized Blues Brothers replica.
Then there's the arcade room and the lion's den, where taxidermied relatives of Simba perch on a ledge overlooking the living room.
The 40-seat theater room, which takes up the entire second floor, boasts a projection screen and a collection of country-western music memorabilia rivaling that of a museum.
And the '70s conception kitchen. And the indoor waterfall. And the 80-foot cave linking the house to its newest and largest treasure: the Jungle Book back yard.
There, live peacocks roam the grounds protected by a 14-foot gorilla piloting a three-quarter-scale biwing airplane. A Hollywood sign adorns the roof. There are no real snakes in the swimming pool or the 8,000-gallon koi pond, but a 40-foot-long foam one winds from the trees around the outer fence.
"We consider it the hidden secret of Pinellas Park," Spencer said.
What's it like living in a virtual amusement park? Completely normal, Spencer says.
"We don't see anything unusual about it," said Spencer, sitting in the Gunslinger Saloon, complete with swinging wood doors, flocked wallpaper and whiskey barrel chairs.
"We couldn't live anywhere else. We certainly don't have to leave the house for any reason," he added, laughing.
Now, the couple want to open their theme home to the public for use as a reception and party venue. They've also invited everyone from Playboy magazine to the Florida Film Commission to use the property as a set.
Wayne Emond, the couple's events coordinator, said those deals are still being developed.
Dean Neal, zoning director of Pinellas Park, said Friday that he was unaware of the Spencers' plans and said they will likely need commercial zoning for the types of activities they want to host.
"A lot of it depends on how often he's going to do this," Neal said. "We don't have a particular land use where we address that particular kind of thing. It sounds novel.
"Typically, residential neighborhoods are not designed to handle heavy traffic," he added. "The neighbors tend to have problems with things like this."
Not on the Spencers' block. Calls to three of the couple's neighbors were not returned, but at least two families support the Spencers' plans.
"I think it's great what they're doing there," said 39-year-old Maria Pena, the Spencers' neighbor and friend of 16 years, during a phone interview Thursday. "It wouldn't bother me at all."
James Strosser, another neighbor, agrees. The 60-year-old has lived half a block away from the couple for 10 years.
"I think it's wonderful," said Strosser, who doesn't know the Spencers. "Why not? Do I have any objections to it? No. I think it's his business what he does with his house."
Neighbors' consent aside, Emond said they have additional legal and financial plans to make before they are ready to rent out the space for big corporate events and weddings.
"These are things that are in negotiation and they're going to take time," said Emond, a Disney-trained sculptor who also designs and does sculptures for the Spencers. He and Spencer are the creative team behind the themes.
"Me and Bill got together and one idea led to another," said Emond, 42. "We just kept creating and creating and creating."
When they work out the zoning details, Spencer said they will be capable of hosting up to 350 people on the 1-acre property. Though they paid $24,000 for what started as a 1,000-square-foot, four-room colonial in 1976, Spencer said he has spent nearly $1-million renovating and adding to it.
For him, the house has never been about the money.
"We love seeing the expressions on people's faces," he said. "It wouldn't be the money end of it. I'd like not to boast about my home, but share my home with the public.
"I want to put my money where I can see it, feel it, smell it every day," he added.
"We're not travelers," his wife Miriam added, gazing out over the back yard. "This is our vacation."
Despite all they've done, the themes don't ever seem to stop at the Spencer home. (A Roman Bath bedroom, underwater office and Jurassic Park section in the back yard are all coming soon.) Perhaps they never will.
One day, it will be the ultimate home of his themes, his wife said.
"He enjoys it, he does it good and it's tasteful," his wife said. "This is his entertainment. He's a frustrated club owner and this is his club."
- Jade Jackson Lloyd can be reached at 727 893-8410 or jlloyd@sptimes.com
