Erik SeoReminisce about the 4BIHouse with Erik Seo's Farewell 4BIHouse Gallery.

If you drove by it, you wouldn't be able to tell it apart from any of the countless other brick rental houses nearby the University of Utah. But to a handful of avid skiers from the eastern United States, it's much more than that.

For years, the 4BIHouse served as the base of operations for the award-winning amateur ski film company 4BI9 Media. It was also the place where the now legendary Tom Wallisch hung his hat throughout much of his gritty rise to freeskiing fame. And it was home, over its luminous tenure, to many a transplanted student skier, and a revolving door to countless other young skiers passing through.

Farewell 4BIHouse Gallery »

And then the all too well known housing crunch put an all too lamentable end to that legacy. This August, mounting mortgage payments forced the 4BIHouse landlord into foreclosure, and the 4BI9 family back into the rental market.

"It was definitely a sad day moving out of that house," said Dave Euler, a former resident of the house, and a current student at the University of Utah.

Once Euler and his former roommates Tim Maney, AJ Dakoulas, Tom Wallisch, Ryan Wyble, Steve Stepp, and Rich Fahey learned of their landlord's plight, they had only two weeks to secure new lodgings in the midst of the rental-depleting August rush back to college. The sextet all found safe rooves in the time allotted. But worries remain about whether the magic of the original 4BIHouse will ever be duplicated.

"Our new place will be a new sort of 4BIHouse," surmised Ryan Wyble. "But I'm worried it may end up a mere shadow of its former self. The partying and general disregard for our own well-being will most likely diminish in this new house. It's rather unfortunate — yet fortunate at the same time."

Farewell 4BIHouse Gallery »