The months run so quick and March and spring are here. San Diego is full of activities, concerts, acts and other things to do as for example OH! San Diego. The San Diego Architectural Foundation, with the help of many volunteers, organizes each year an «Architectural Open House» weekend. This gives you the opportunity to visit several buildings or architectural places as parks or neighborhoods which most of them are not opened to the public during the year. There are also free guide tours through the most interesting places in San Diego such as Balboa Park, Petco Stadium or the New Public Library in Downtown.
Using again one of my Friday off every other week, I started my long weekend on a tour through Balboa Park and the history of its development during the Panama-California Expo in 1915. The tour was presented by a guide who was one of the architects who took part on the conservation and rebuild of the preexisting buildings. To me was really amazing the process how they redrawn the set plans of the buildings through old pictures, because there weren’t any originals plant of them.
Saturday was the day dedicated to visit the mission hills neighbor, where I had the opportunity to break into some of the most expensive and beautiful houses in this city (despite La Jolla area). Famous architects in San Diego dream to have the chance to build one house on the slopes of this neighborhood, facing one of the most beautiful sunset views of the Downtown. We also had the opportunity to talk with the owners of one of the house and have a drink with her.
Last but not least, Sunday was the turn for the Petco Park Stadium guide tour. This is the Home of the Major baseball league team «Los Padres». This stadium is consider by the fans as the number 1 in the whole country where you can watch a game (as soon as the season begins I will write an entry about it). We went thorugh all the private places, like the press conference room, lockers room, VIP areas and facilities in the stadium that makes the whole thing works every game day. At the end of the tour we visited the Hall of Fame of the stadium where every person who took part of the construction of the stadium has a brick on the floor with his name.
After this amazing tour, which I totally recomend, it was time to enjoy the beautifull sunset of San Diego, waiting for the next adventure.
I would like to congratulate all the OH! San Diego team and their volunteers to make this event possible and try to bring closer the architecture, design and history of San Diego to the people. See you again next year.
