Recycled Spirits of Iron (Ex Nihilo Sculpture Park)

The story

Drive east past Elbe on State Route 706 toward Mount Rainier, and the dark evergreen backdrop suddenly erupts into a jungle of oxidized iron. This is Ex Nihilo—Latin for 'out of nothing'—the life's work of sculptor Dan Klennert, who spent decades scouring Pacific Northwest scrapyards and farm auctions to haul back tons of industrial detritus. What looks from the road like an abandoned junkyard reveals itself up close as an intricate, open-air gallery of metal beasts and surreal mechanisms sprouting directly from the forest floor.

Nothing here came from a art supplier. Klennert took discarded wrench sets, tractor blades, radiator fans, and timber cables, welding them into form without smoothing over their past lives. Walk right up to the colossal spider or the 40-foot seahorse, and your eye starts picking out the raw components: a creature's ribcage made of rusted pitchfork tines, a spine constructed from interlocking socket ratchets, or an oversized high-wheel bicycle assembled from scrap iron. It is heavy junk elevated through sheer patience and a blowtorch.

Klennert has since retired and handed stewardship of the property to family members, who continue to maintain the open grounds and keep the park growing. It remains one of the last true offbeat roadside pitstops on the approach to Rainier—an unpolished, self-guided sanctuary where industrial ruin gets quieted by the trees.