Unexpected faces in the window of Sparks Gallery in the Gaslamp Quarter. This colorful work of art commands the attention of anyone passing down the sidewalk.
The Gaslamp Quarter is usually bustling with humanity, as people shop, dine and take a stroll through the historic heart of downtown San Diego. But occasionally unexpected faces appear!
A mannequin high in a building window made me do a double take as I walked down Sixth Avenue through San Diego’s Gaslamp!A stylish Tatyana on a Gaslamp shop’s sign.Doug Loves Movies so much it seems he has forgotten to shave. A funny face spotted while strolling down a sidewalk, camera in hand.This unexpected face has no skin. The Chrome Domes seem mostly bones.A mischievous face painted next to a deserted patio. Dick’s Last Resort in the Gaslamp has closed after many years.The Grinch is smiling and behaving unexpectedly unGrinchlike in this fun artwork inside the front window of The Chuck Jones Gallery.Very cool! It’s Steve McQueen sporting some shades. An image above the windows of Eyes On Fifth.A large face painted on the brick wall inside a Gaslamp Quarter restaurant is an unexpected, arresting sight.
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This blog now features thousands of photos around San Diego! Are you curious? There’s lots of cool stuff to check out!
Here’s the Cool San Diego Sights main page, where you can read the most current blog posts. If you’re using a small mobile device, click those three parallel lines up at the top–that opens up my website’s sidebar, where you’ll see the most popular posts, a search box, and more!
To enjoy future posts, you can also “like” Cool San Diego Sights on Facebook or follow me on Twitter.
Colorful dots on the side of a building in downtown San Diego.
Every walk through the city is a voyage of discovery. Everywhere you turn there are sudden surprises of color, form and depth. An inquisitive scientist might see geometric order; an artist might discern shades, intimations, emotion.
This morning, during a walk through downtown, I photographed dots, squares, cubes and a rather crazy tangle.
Six blue squares on the north side of the Columbia Place building.Steel cubes on west side of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, which is housed in the Santa Fe Depot’s old baggage terminal. Art by Richard Serra, 2005. Litter atop cube 1 is by Anonymous. Idealized (though rusty) art meets messy (real) life.A crazy tangle of electrical lines in the entrance of the David C. Copley Building in downtown San Diego. A sculpture at MCASD. Power Maze with Sconce, Roman de Salvo, 1998.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Tourist on a Segway passes a disabled Santa in a wheelchair.
Life contains mingled joy and sadness. These feeling intensify as Christmas nears.
Christmas is a season brimming with generosity and hope. But the difficulties we all face persist. And for some, those difficulties are extreme.
During my walk this afternoon beneath dark, dramatic storm clouds, I captured a few images of human sadness, joy . . . and hope.
Storm clouds above downtown San Diego. Christmas is coming, but so is winter.Palm trees in a row buffeted by a strong chilly wind on a late November day.Someone camped against the San Diego County Courthouse. The number of homeless people downtown continues to grow.Using spice as a drug is a recipe for disaster. Drug use by the many homeless in downtown has become alarming. Lives are being visibly destroyed.The relatively new Horton Plaza Park now attracts homeless people seeking a comfortable place. A deeply sad situation with no easy solution.But there is also hope, and the potential for joy. A child is shown the dancing fountain at the center of Horton Plaza Park.Youthful eyes peer into a fountain hopefully. What is it they possibly see? Dreams filled with light?There is much one can do to brighten this world. I saw this example as I walked. Be the voice of a foster child. Provide hope, and a smile.Will it be a white Christmas in San Diego? Probably not. But perhaps Christmas is something more than mere dreams.I spotted a typical Christmas tree in a shopping center. But this one is special. It’s a giving tree.USO San Diego needs your help to bring holiday cheer to active military families. (Please click the image to read details.)The sun breaks through storm clouds and shines upon downtown San Diego. There is much we can do. A faint rainbow appears like magic above.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk. You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
If you’d like to read an inspiring tale about human generosity, you might enjoy a favorite short story that I’ve written, An Unexpected Sunflower.
Youthful members of All About Music San Diego prepare to play instrumental music at 2016 Christmas on the Prado in Balboa Park.
Early this afternoon, before the threatened rain might begin, I headed up to Balboa Park to enjoy a bit of the 3rd Annual Christmas on the Prado. This celebration of Christmas is put on by the San Diego Children’s Coalition and the San Diego Community Christmas Committee; it shouldn’t be confused with December Nights, a more diverse holiday event in Balboa Park which used to be called “Christmas on the Prado”. December Nights will take place next week.
When I arrived, the event was just getting underway and many booths were still being erected. I caught a few early performances and some of the Christmas spirit. Here are a few photos!
The San Diego Community Christmas Center’s nativity display at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion is viewed by families during Christmas on the Prado.The nativity display shows scenes from the Bible concerning the birth of Christ.Shepherds are visited by an angel.Children view a scene depicting the birth of Jesus in a humble manger.A shack magically transported from the North Pole provides treats at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion during Christmas on the Prado.Christmas sweets include cookies!A brightly decorated tree and traditional Christmas music inside the House of Ireland at Balboa Park’s International Cottages.A small but cheerful Christmas tree inside the House of England.Inside the House of Norway, children make tiny paper Christmas baskets to hang on a tree among ornaments.Adding color to Christmas cookies inside the House of Norway.A youth ballet company practices before they take the stage at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion.A children’s group sings joyful carols and other merry songs during Christmas on the Prado.Getting a Christmas tree ready where Santa will sit in the evening, after nightfall.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Two different buildings are reflected in the glass windows of 101 W. Broadway. On the left is the Spreckels Theater Building; on the right is the Sofia Hotel.
I confess that I love reflections. They often seem magical, like a glowing vision of intermingled dimensions. So I had to take more photos today of windows reflected in glass windows.
Walking down Broadway in downtown San Diego is like moving through a funhouse maze. Left and right, the mirrors rise into the sky. One passes through an otherworldly geometry of reflected forms; light dances like the spinning sun upon bright buildings.
Strangely distorted reflections in the windows of a San Diego high-rise.The old Armed Services YMCA building is reflected in the glass windows above the entrance of 501 W. Broadway.One America Plaza, San Diego’s tallest building, seen in a grid of windows across Broadway.San Diego’s distinctive Emerald Plaza reflected in the windows of 501 W. Broadway.The Westgate Hotel building gleams in the windows of 225 Broadway, the former NBC building.Unusual geometry caused by multiple reflections observed from street level.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Check out some photos of cool, creative door handles that I’ve spotted while walking around San Diego. I snapped a couple of these photographs months ago, and unfortunately I’ve forgotten where I took them. I guess I’m not terribly organized! Or perhaps I’m just lazy and took no notes.
Electric guitar door handle at Hard Rock Cafe in San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter.Two door handles made of artistically bent rebar.These door handles at the Yard House don’t contain beer. One must step inside.Interesting door handles together form a disk and raised leaf.One very ornate door handle in San Diego.A lion’s head handle on a rusty gate.
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Turkey hats on runners preparing for the Father Joe’s Villages Thanksgiving Day 5K, an annual event to help San Diego’s homeless.
This morning thousands gathered in Balboa Park to participate in the Father Joe’s Villages Thanksgiving Day 5K run and walk. Money raised during the annual event helps Father Joe’s Villages provide food, shelter, medical care, employment training and hope for many of San Diego’s homeless.
If you’d like to donate to Father Joe’s, or learn more about what they do, here’s their website.
Homeless man on Sixth Avenue, across the street from Balboa Park.Thousands gather in Balboa Park’s Plaza de Panama before the start of Father Joe’s Villages Thanksgiving Day 5K run and walk.Many Thanksgiving-themed costumes and hats could be spotted among the participants. These dogs are already in the Christmas spirit!Energy-providing fruit slices are prepared for the 5K participants before the beginning of the race.The Knights of Columbus had a pancake breakfast in Balboa Park during the Father Joe’s Villages Thanksgiving Day 5K.Catholic priests perform a religious service in the Plaza de Panama for the faithful before the Thanksgiving race to help the homeless.Runners and walkers head toward the start line in Balboa Park. Morning sun shines on the iconic California Tower.Thousands of participants pass over the Cabrillo Bridge, just prior to beginning the Father Joe’s Villages Thanksgiving Day 5K.This family is dressed like a Pilgrim and a turkey dinner!People get enthused a few minutes before the fun run begins.Homeless person alone on the sunlit grass in a corner of Balboa Park.Getting ready to start a competitive 5K run on Thanksgiving morning. Money raised helps provide food and shelter for the homeless in San Diego.
Christmas angels peer out of a window at Silver Crossing in Seaport Village.
Radical changes are coming to nearly 40-year-old Seaport Village. A redevelopment plan that was recently approved will transform the quaint collection of shops and restaurants on downtown’s waterfront into a massive complex called Seaport San Diego. The new development will contain even more shopping and dining options, several hotels, a 480-foot observation tower, a public beach, aquarium, Smithsonian attraction, and more.
Many of the shops that people have come to know over the years will vanish. Admittedly, Seaport Village today is a touristy hodgepodge. One wouldn’t really expect to see a New England lighthouse in Southern California. But no matter. I still enjoy meandering through on a sunny weekend! There are buskers aplenty and live music and people-watching and the nearby grassy park with kites flying in the breeze. And onion rings and pretzels and ice cream!
And there are the windows. Kaleidoscope windows. Windows winking with color. Windows painted with unexpected images. Windows full of gaudy trinkets, the typical souvenirs, whimsical novelties, and even a rare treasure or two you’ll find nowhere else.
Here are a few of the windows.
A lady holding a colorful bouquet in the window of Seaport Deli and Salad Bar.Beach, clouds, muffin and coffee in a window of the Seaport Cookie Company.Exotic masks for a masquerade in one window of Upstart Crow Bookstore and Coffeehouse.Floral designs around one window of the Seaport Fudge Factory.Window mural painted by San Diego artist Joel Sharp in 1996. You can find it in Seaport Village at Margaritas Kitchen and Cantina.Christopher M., known as The Painter of Chefs, has samples of his work displayed in one window of Exclusive Collections Gallery in Seaport Village.Delightful characters fill the window at The Mugger in Seaport Village.A window full of irresistible treats at the Seaport Cookie Company.There are several smiling faces in this Upstart Crow window. Can you spot all three?Zoltar the fortune teller will read your future from his own small window.Coral and other beautiful objects in a window of Seaport Village Shell Co. Limited.Tourists might take home a glittery San Diego sombrero once they glimpse these in the window of Mexican Fiesta.Sunflowers and blue window frames at Frost Me Gourmet Cupcakes in Seaport Village.
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This blog now features thousands of photos around San Diego! Are you curious? There’s lots of cool stuff to check out!
Here’s the Cool San Diego Sights main page, where you can read the most current blog posts. If you’re using a small mobile device, click those three parallel lines up at the top–that opens up my website’s sidebar, where you’ll see the most popular posts, a search box, and more!
To enjoy future posts, you can also “like” Cool San Diego Sights on Facebook or follow me on Twitter.
What are you grateful for? Random people in Balboa Park write their thoughts. They are grateful for life, family, school, warm socks, waking up to sunrises, and people who smile for no reason.
I stumbled upon a heartwarming sight in Balboa Park–just a few days before Thanksgiving.
A couple named Gratitude Gal and Gratitude Guy were greeting people who were walking down El Prado. The smiling pair carried a dry-erase board. People were invited to write down a few things in life for which they were grateful. Many of those random people did.
Thanksgiving is three days away. But it seems to me that every single day is an appropriate time to give thanks. Happiness is a choice.
A random person walking along happily writes down a few reasons why they are thankful.Gratitude Gal and Gratitude Guy collect messages of thanksgiving on a dry erase board in Balboa Park.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
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