Most abandoned homes spark Bryan Sansivero’s curiosity, but a circus-themed mansion in New York’s Catskills region is one the photographer said he won’t ever forget.

Bryan Sansivero has spent years photographing hundreds of abandoned buildings across the US. He’s explored deserted hospitals, stepped inside homes frozen in time, and published a book of his haunting photographs, “American Decay: Inside America’s Forgotten Homes.”

Of all the homes he has photographed, one, in particular, stands out: a house in New York’s Catskills region that has circus-themed rooms.

“I’ve never found a house where each room is so different than the previous room in terms of full-on color, the decay, and the overall look,” he said.

After seeing the abandoned, circus-themed mansion on Instagram, Sansivero tracked down its address in upstate New York and traveled there for the first time in 2019.

A house with flaking wallpaper, vibrant colors, and an odd clown theme started popping up on Sansivero’s Instagram feed in 2019.

Nicknamed the “Catskill Clown House” online, it was the perfect combination of Sansivero’s interests.

It was eerie, unfamiliar, creepy, and colorful — everything he’s drawn to, he told Insider.

After reaching out to other photographers, he eventually tracked down the house’s location and visited it for the first time that year.

Sansivero said he was surprised by the home’s massive size and that it seemed like an ordinary house from the outside.

Vines crawled up the home’s exterior walls, and the front yard teemed with weeds and overgrowth.

Formerly a winery, the property had overgrown grapevines and other buildings he would later explore.

While Sansivero could tell the house was influenced by older architecture, he said it had a surprisingly modern appearance.

When he stepped inside, he said he came across even more surprises.

Inside was an eerie, decaying interior, and the entryway had vibrant yellow paint peeling off its walls.

After his first few steps inside the mansion, Sansivero said he realized the house was much more unusual than he envisioned.

“The house blows your expectations,” he said. “Every single room in the house is something you want to photograph.”

Upstairs, Sansivero found a handful of odd bedrooms. The most surprising was a room with a circus-themed diamond pattern along its wall.

Sansivero said there were at least four bedrooms, and a dilapidated playset outside leads him to believe that the mansion was once home to a family with children.

Sansivero said he thinks the circus-themed room was a child’s bedroom because of its smaller size and playful patterns.

The circus theme continued from the diamond-patterned walls to the ceiling, which featured a circus tent motif.

Another bedroom featured a bold pop of orange on its walls.

Another bedroom on the second story had a bright-orange color splashed across its walls.

Blue paint had chipped off of the ceiling and was scattered across the floor.

The circus theme continued into the bathroom, where red and white stripes were painted across its walls.

Bright-red paint peeled from the walls, which were once clean-cut stripes mimicking a circus tent.

The closets also weren’t without color.

In the main bedroom, a bullfighter was painted onto one closet’s wall.

Downstairs, light illuminated the home’s decaying floors, peeling walls, and crumbling ceiling.

Sansivero said it became clear that no one had lived in the home for years.

While the majority of the home had bright hues of pink, purple, and yellow, the library took on a darker style.

From the floor to the ceiling, the room was covered in dark wood — except for one wall that had a nature scene painted onto it.

“All of the sudden you’re in this muted room,” he said. “And then you turn around and there’s this crazy painted wall.”

After the first visit, Sansivero went back three more times to capture the perfect shots.

Sansivero said he knew this place was unique and unlikely to remain in the same condition for long.

Each time Sansivero visited, things around the house had been moved or relocated, and he said he feared that other trespassers would graffiti the walls or potentially ruin the home.

Before that could happen, Sansivero was committed to getting his perfect shots.

“I shot it, and then I was like, ‘Oh shoot, I didn’t get this shot’ or ‘I could get this shot better,’” he said.

So Sansivero went back again and again, each time, perfecting his images.

Sansivero said he tries to find bits of mail or artifacts that shed light on the people who used to occupy the abandoned homes he photographs. In this house, he found an old real-estate listing.

Inside the kitchen, Sansivero said he found a piece of paper that showed the house was for sale with the name of a realtor.

Jotted on the sheet of paper was each time the realtor visited the home. The last date was marked 2017, he said.

Sansivero guessed that the owners gave up trying to sell the house in 2017, and it sat abandoned for years after.

Looking at the images he shot, Sansivero said the home evokes a sort of sadness.

Sansivero said it was clear to him that the abandoned house was once loved.

“There’s a sense of loss,” he said. “That sense that there was once life here and now there’s not.”

Today, Sansivero said the home is no longer abandoned, which likely means the peeling circus ceiling, diamond patterns, and vibrant colors are long gone.

Since photographing the home, Sansivero said he’s learned that it’s sold.

He can’t imagine the decay was repairable, so he said it’s unlikely the home looks similar to how he photographed it.

Ultimately, he said he’s happy the once-loved space has likely welcomed life again.