The Mountain Mermaid

Bill Buerge, owner of The Mountain Mermaid, has been involved in the visual arts all of his life.

His paintings and designs are on permanent display at The Smithsonian Institution, in the collection of Syracuse University in New York and in many private collections.

Buerge received a BFA Degree in Painting and Drawing from the University of California, Long Beach in 1970. He was a freelance Illustrator for twenty years working for The Saturday Evening Post, IBM, NBC, Capitol Records, the Los Angeles Times, and many others. He taught illustration at UCLB, has been an art director, and was a designer at the Alaska State Centennial Exposition in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Around 1985, Buerge volunteered to help save the historic Methodist Aldersgate Retreat Center in his home town of Pacific Palisades, California. The building, dating to the late 1800s, had been in a deteriorating condition and the Church was considering selling the property which they had owned since 1927. Buerge saw the renovation to completion and the Church decided to keep the facility. Today, Aldersgate continues to fulfill its mission as a non-profit, non-denominational retreat facility.

Buerge also built a post-and-beam, craftsman-styled chapel on the Aldersgate property with contributions from his parents, his brother, John, and others. It is now used for meetings, memorials, weddings and quiet contemplation. Buerge Chapel and Meditation Garden won the Pacific Palisades Civic League Community Beautification Special Award for 1992 and an award from The Southern California Landscaping Association.

During the past fifteen years, Buerge has restored other historic properties. In 1989 he purchased the crumbling 1930s Sylvia Park Country Club in Topanga and has been slowly bringing it back to life ever since. It is his home and was declared a State Point Of Historic Interest in 1993. Now called The Mountain Mermaid, it is sometimes used for Topanga gatherings and still-photography projects. For contributions to community, Buerge and The Mountain Mermaid have received commendations from the California State Senate, the California State Legislature and the County of Los Angeles. Buerge was chosen Citizen of the Year 2000 by the Topanga Chamber of Commerce.