A sneak peek was enjoyed yesterday inside the new UC San Diego Park & Market building, in downtown’s East Village neighborhood!
The special public tour was part of the San Diego Architectural Foundation’s big annual Open House event.
UC San Diego Park & Market is designed to be a collaborative hub where students, researchers, community organizations and business partners will interact in the heart of the city. It will also feature space for private conferences and events, and high quality entertainment venues for the public.
Once completed, the building will be home to a digital movie theater, a top notch black box theater, a small art gallery, a bistro, and a huge two-sided video wall that can be enjoyed inside on the ground floor and from the Market Street sidewalk!
This unique, truly visionary multi-use facility will have its grand opening in a couple months during Cinco de Mayo. It sounds like the celebration will be epic!
During yesterday’s tour led by Mary Walshok, UC San Diego Associate Vice Chancellor, several floors of the innovative building were explored. We learned about its conception and development. One of its most important qualities is its location next to a UC San Diego Blue Line trolley station, connecting this extension of UCSD to the main La Jolla campus, providing students easy accessibility.
As you can see from my upcoming photographs, Park & Market will certainly become a stimulating cultural destination for people living downtown and around San Diego. Numerous future events and festivals are being planned. I can’t wait!
Please read my photo captions to learn a little more about this amazing project!
The next photo shows the public plaza north of the building, adjacent to the new The Merian apartment tower. It’s where our tour group gathered.
Two fantastic murals by regional artists can be found in the inviting space. I posted photos of both murals back in January here.
Standing on the second floor terrace north of the building, with downtown views in several directions. (I didn’t photograph it, but one can see Balboa Park’s California Tower in the distance from here, too!)About to enter the second floor of the glassy building.Outside art is by Tammy Matthews, artist from New South Wales, Australia. Taranora, 2020. Original painting adapted to steel screen.The second floor was busy! A private conference had been booked, even before the building’s official opening! We next headed left to the digital movie theater.Inside the cozy theater, which will be operated by acclaimed Digital Gym Cinema.A small gallery on the second floor, near the top of a grand staircase leading to the ground floor. The debut exhibition concerns UC San Diego’s Stuart Collection. (I’ve blogged about many of these outdoor UCSD public artworks in the past.)Nearby windows look down on downtown San Diego’s busy Market Street.Mary Walshok addresses the group as we stand near the top of the fantastic staircase.Looking down!Now we’re downstairs on the ground floor, after taking the elevators. This big black door is the entrance to the black box theater, where there will be concerts and diverse performances. Unfortunately, we couldn’t go inside.Emerging near the bottom of the spiraling staircase!A bistro will be located here. People can come off the street, dine, sip and hang out. The bistro operator, we were told, has one of the largest vinyl record collections in San Diego!Making our way across the large space near the Market Street entrance. That big black thing is a two-sided computerized video screen! Events can be streamed live from the UCSD amphitheater and other venues. Proposed users include Comic-Con and the San Diego Symphony! Folks walking down the sidewalk can stop to watch outside, too!Pretty cool, huh?Chairs and tables can be set up here. UC San Diego Park & Market will utilize technology to connect people in new and stimulating ways.Finally, we headed to the fourth floor, the research center, where students engaged in projects, and people from academia, non-profits and private business will rub elbows, interact and collaborate. There are many small offices for faculty and community organizations. We didn’t visit the third floor, where classrooms are located.A view up Park Boulevard from one extraordinary new building!
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Today I walked around the amazing Geisel Library Building at UC San Diego. The architectural marvel is part of this weekend’s big San Diego Architectural Foundation’s annual Open House event.
The Geisel Library had no special tour this year, so I merely walked around it, aiming my camera up at the iconic modernist concrete and glass structure.
The appearance of this building is so futuristic and fantastic that it has appeared often in television and film. Anyone who thinks of UCSD likely pictures the Geisel Library.
When I attended UCSD many years ago, it was called simply the Central Library. You can read about its history here.
Of course, Theodor Seuss Geisel was the real name of children’s book author Dr. Seuss, who lived much of his life close by in La Jolla. The library has a huge collection of Dr. Seuss artwork and historical documents, and an exhibit is currently on display just inside the front entrance containing some of those pieces. I’ll be blogging about that very cool exhibit shortly!
If you’ve ever walked around the Geisel Library, you’ve likely encountered a sculpture of Dr. Seuss with the Cat in the Hat, and the very unusual hillside Snake Path. If you haven’t seen these, check out past blog posts here and here!
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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!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Unexpected magic can be discovered inside an old East Village warehouse.
The apparently unremarkable brick building is the surprising home of Space 4 Art’s artist studios!
I’ve walked near the old warehouse several times in the past, taking photos of murals on the building’s exterior, but I had no idea that rampant creativity could be found behind those walls!
Thanks to Space 4 Art’s “Open Studio” event this evening, which was combined with the San Diego Architectural Foundation’s annual Open House San Diego, I and other curious folk could look into the studios and meet friendly artists.
I learned that Space 4 Art provides affordable creative space for local artists, and acts as a neighborhood cultural center, engaging in educational outreach, particularly for youth from underserved communities.
The dream is big. They want to build a large-scale multidisciplinary Arts Center in San Diego. Want to help out? Read more about the Space 4 Art mission here! Read about their history here!
Now, do you want to see what lies behind those murals painted on the old warehouse at 340 16th Street? (A few of which can be seen on a black brick wall here.)
Take a look!
Inside the cool old warehouse. Magic awaits around every corner.Richard is a friendly artist who creates beautiful custom ceramic pieces. Learn more about his amazing artwork here!A peek inside another one of the studios.One hallway wall is covered with these surprising antique clocks. In many cases, small scenes such as the one above can be found inside the clockwork.This awesome cathedral-like creation made of crutches stands at one end of a studio work area. I learned the sculpture is for sale. Any hospitals out there need some unique artwork?Everywhere you turn at Space 4 Art, magic produced by local artists appears.Feeling creative?
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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!
A black sculpture rises skyward at the entrance to the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building in downtown San Diego. Composed of triangular steel forms, the sculpture and its sharp edges pierce the space around it. The monumental public artwork is titled Excalibur.
Excalibur was created in 1976 by Beverly Stoll Pepper, whose pieces have been exhibited and collected by major museums around the world. Beverly Pepper passed away two years ago, but her unique artistic vision continues to enrich our lives.
I walked around Excalibur recently and took these photographs. It was interesting how joined triangles, observed from different angles, produce very different images. It’s like how the larger world, composed of basic elemental structures, achieves its complexity.
The sharp, jutting steel seems to have emerged from underground. And doesn’t the sculpture look almost like folded origami?
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Last weekend I was able to enjoy some amazing views of downtown San Diego. I took photographs from the 9th Floor of San Diego’s Central Library, looking west.
It isn’t often the library’s outdoor Woods Family Sunset View Terrace can be accessed. But a program was scheduled to begin at the Shiley Special Events Suite when I happened to be walking around, and the terrace was open to the public.
Wow! Nice view, huh?
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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!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Walk around the Balboa Park’s historic Botanical Building and you might do a double take. Because a huge hole is now open at the east end, allowing people to look into the monumental building’s interior!
I paused for a moment and took these photos over the construction fence. You can see how the old garden walkways have vanished, leaving the trees and plants rising from bare soil.
If you’d like to read about the Botanical Building and Gardens Restoration and Enhancement Project, and see artist renderings and historical photographs, click here.
Much of the work will repair damage “due to termite damage, rust and deferred maintenance.” The iconic Botanical Building will be restored to its original 1915 appearance. Amenities will also be added, like new restrooms, and a historically recreated pergola near its west end.
The Botanical Building is one of four structures built for the 1915 Panama California Exposition that were meant to be permanent. But after more than a century, a little tender loving care for one of the largest wood lath structures in the world is required!
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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!
Near the center of Lindo Lake stands the Boathouse, originally built in 1887.
I walked around the charming boathouse last weekend. It was like strolling through a gentle, pastoral painting.
The canvas was painted with water, trees, white roses, mountains, blue sky and many birds, including Canada and domestic geese, egrets, and mallard ducks.
Enjoy these photographs of tranquil beauty on a winter’s Sunday.
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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!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
If you’ve ever walked from Fletcher Cove in Solana Beach toward Highway 101, you’ve probably noticed a large, super colorful mural. The artwork is painted on the west side of the Saddle Bar, on Acacia Avenue.
During my most recent visit to Solana Beach, I ambled up to the mural and discovered the old building it decorates has a Solana Beach Civic Historical Society plaque.
The building was originally the Mayme and Charles Karn’s Bicycle Shop back in 1924. It served as a United States Post Office from 1936 to 1953.
The mural was painted in 2019 by Cardiff-by-the-Sea artist Dustin (Brane) Hull.
Images in the artwork include: a friendly dog; a woman surfing; carrying surfboards on the beach; a kid skateboarding; a musician performing at the famous Belly Up Tavern; a Coaster train and the Solana Beach station; and Fiesta Del Sol, an annual festival held on the nearby streets.
I love this mural. It really captures the happy vibe of this beach community.
I took these photos!
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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!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
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