What to See in Redstone - Top Sights and Attractions

Mansion in Redstone, Colorado. Redstone Castle, also known as Cleveholm or Osgood Castle, is a mansion south of Redstone, Colorado, United States. It is a large timber frame structure built in the early 20th century as the home of John C. Osgood, founder of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, in a simplified version of the Stick style. In 1971 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places, the first property in Pitkin County to be listed. It was later additionally listed as a contributing property to the Redstone Historic District.

The castle was at the south end of the planned company town of Redstone, meant by Osgood to be an improvement over the usual housing and conditions in Western mining towns of the late 19th century. Just across the Crystal River were the coke ovens that processed coal mined higher up in the mountains and loaded onto a rail line. Miners and cokers in the town lived in cottages with electricity and running water, considered luxury items at the time. At his mansion, Osgood, at the time one of the country's richest men, entertained guests like Theodore Roosevelt, John D. Rockefeller and King Leopold of Belgium, who joined him on hunts. The lush interior features European antique furniture and work by Gustav Stickley and Louis Comfort Tiffany. Its design was supposedly based on the ancestral home of Osgood's wife Alma.

Redstone's prosperity ended within a decade, after Osgood lost control of the company, and he spent less time there. He returned to the property in the late 1920s to die. His wife tried to convert the house into a resort, but the Great Depression made that economically unviable; however, later owners were able to run it as a hotel into the 1990s.

A recent owner who tried to refurbish was indicted in a financial fraud scheme, and the Internal Revenue Service sold it to compensate victims in its first-ever online auction of seized real property. It was sold again in 2016, and after a renovation, owners Steve and April Carver opened a ten-room boutique hotel in the castle in November 2018. It is also open for daily public tours. The 2006 film The Prestige used the castle as a location.^[1]

Building in Redstone, Colorado. The Redstone Inn is located on Redstone Boulevard in Redstone, Colorado, United States. It is a structure in the Tudor Revival architectural styles built at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1980 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is also a contributing property to the Redstone Historic District listed on the register nine years later.

When it was built, it served as a dormitory for unmarried male workers, primarily miners, at the Colorado Fuel & Iron (CF&I) company's coal mines and coking ovens nearby. It was part of the company town, with modest cottages for the miners and their families as well as a school, recreation center, firehouse and other public buildings, that CF&I president John Cleveland Osgood, had spent lavishly to create along with his nearby estate. The mines were closed in 1908, and the village nearly abandoned, the dormitory among them. Most of its original buildings were demolished or moved, but the dormitory survived, and was restored and converted to its current use in mid-century.^[2]

The Osgood–Kuhnhausen House, also known as Carina's Cottage, is located on Redstone Boulevard in Redstone, Colorado, United States. It is a timber frame structure built at the beginning of the 20th century in the Tudor Revival architectural style. In 1983 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Redstone was established at that time by John C. Osgood, founder of the Colorado Fuel and Iron (CF&I) company, one of the largest mining companies in the state. Wanting the coal miners and coking workers at the nearby mines and coke ovens to live in comfortable housing, Osgood built hundreds of cottages as part of his company town. Most were abandoned a decade later when CF&I shut the facilities down, and were eventually demolished or moved. The Kuhnhausen house was one of the few that have remained largely intact on their original sites.^[3]

The Redstone Historic District is located in and near the unincorporated community of that name in western Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. It includes the original community of Redstone as built by Colorado Fuel and Iron for the coal miners it employed. In 1989 it was recognized as a historic district and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Redstone was originally a company town. John Cleveland Osgood, CFI's president at the time, spent lavishly to create quality housing for miners and their families, as well as various other public buildings, in an effort to forestall unionization. Architect Theodore Boal designed simple yet attractive structures by adapting various Victorian architectural styles. The district includes as contributing properties Osgood's estate, Cleveholm, and the Redstone Inn.

At first very populous and successful due to the high production capacity of the nearby coke ovens, Redstone was almost abandoned within a decade when it became too costly to transport coke from the remote community to CFI's new steel mill. A handful of residents remained, keeping Redstone from becoming another one of Colorado's many ghost towns. Some of its original buildings were demolished over the years. Eventually the town rebounded slightly and today is home to a small arts community; many of the remaining buildings have been restored. It is one of the few intact company towns remaining in the state.^[4]