SAN DIEGO, CA - May 3, 2021 - Save Our Heritage Organisation, San Diego's countywide preservation group, celebrates its 38th annual People In Preservation Awards, on Thursday, May 27, during National Preservation Month with an online award presentation, demonstrating that the pandemic has not halted the valiant efforts of local preservationists and their projects.
This year's awards will honor twelve distinctive projects and people ranging across multiple historic preservation mediums, from building restorations and adaptive reuse to historic community traditions and important arts and cultural centers, with an outstanding group of people and projects, including the extensive restoration of a Mid-Century Modern coastal gem, the rehabilitation of a support building at the beloved Hotel del Coronado, and the recognition of a long-time writer especially known for her work in La Jolla.
On Niagara Avenue in Ocean Beach, you will find a charming turn-of-the-20th-century cottage that plays host each spring to abundant blooms of colorful purple wisteria vines. Each year, Susan and Pat James open their historic home and its magical gardens to members of Ocean Beach Historical Society and community dwellers to gather and share its history and greater history of the neighborhood.
The Fort Rosecrans Post Exchange, now more commonly referred to as Navy Building 158, is situated within the Fort Rosecrans Historic District and was constructed in1908 for use as a post exchange and gymnasium. Boasting a Georgian Revival architectural style, this large red brick building was recommended for remodeling many times, but these projects never happened, and the historic building has sat vacant for the last 20 years.
The tale of the formation of Chicano Park, a National Historic Landmark, is one of San Diego's most moving activist and preservation stories. Author Beatrice Zamora and illustrator Maira Meza set out to tell this important story and share the history of the development of Logan Heights and Barrio Logan in their bilingual children's book The Spirit of Chicano Park / El espíritu del parque Chicano.
When Breeann and Nick Zamonis bought their historic 1925 Spanish Revival style home with Monterey influences in Mission Hills, it had undergone multiple renovations. Luckily, a historic photo of the home from around 1925 was found, and restoration work began. This key photograph compiled with others from throughout the century lead to the removal of the front addition to restore the original entryway, and reconstruction of the original cantilevered wood balcony. Now, the Walter and Margaret Trepte House shines with all the former glory of its original 1920s design.
You will be hard pressed to find another writer who has a better way with words for sharing San Diego and La Jolla history than La Jolla Historical Society historian Carol Olten. The breadth of topics she has written about include discussions of popular architectural styles and building types in La Jolla. She has also chronicled La Jolla landmarks, such as the Red Roost and Red Rest, the long-lost Green Dragon Colony, and the magnificent Marine Room.
When the iconic Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) Munk Laboratory at the University of California, San Diego's Scripps Institute of Oceanography began to show the wear and tear of decades situated on the coast, Sam Farmer, Facilities Management Project Manager at UCSD, and a dedicated team of professionals stepped in to rehabilitate and preserve this important modern resource. Designed by San Diego Master Architect Lloyd Ruocco and constructed in 1963, the post and beam style building remains highly regarded for its organic design, functionality, and exterior redwood siding that blends with the natural bluffs overlooking the Pacific.
This year, four different groups and projects are being recognized within Balboa Park. The San Diego Automotive Museum has received a major facelift with the recreation of four historic murals in tile. The work is thanks to the Committee of One Hundred, whose mission is to preserve and protect the park's Spanish Colonial style architecture. When the Automotive Museum, located on the Palisades Plaza, was constructed for the 1935 California Pacific International Exposition, these four monumental murals hung over the entrance.
On Park Boulevard across from Inspiration Point is the Centro Cultural de la Raza, a cultural community center, whose mission is to create, promote, preserve, and educate about Chicano, Mexican, Latino, and Indigenous art and culture. Amelia Enrique, president of Centro Cultural de la Raza, heads this essential community center now celebrating its 50th year. The center was founded in 1970 in Balboa Park, and today occupies a rehabilitated water tank with murals on the exterior by nine local artists.
Nearby you will find another concrete water tank that has been adaptively reused and converted into the vibrant and colorful home of non-profit multi-cultural arts organization, the WorldBeat Cultural Center. Covered inside and out with cultural murals, the center is dedicated to promoting, presenting and preserving the African Diaspora and Indigenous cultures of the world through music, art, dance, multi-media arts, and education, by offering programs and events, including art shows, poetry readings, musical performances and dancing, crafts, and exhibits, and the George Washington Carver EthnoBotany Peace Garden.
And, finally, the Balboa Park Conservancy raised the funds and organized a collaborative restoration of Alcazar Garden with the City of San Diego. In 2019, work began on various water features, landscape and tree trimming, walkway updates, restoration of the historic art tiles, and fresh coats of paint matching historical color schemes.
The Hotel del Coronado, an 1888 Victorian landmark operated by BRE Hotels and Resorts, rests on the beach in Coronado. Often overlooked support buildings, like the Laundry Building, a single-story brick construction, have been neglected over time. In 2019, an adaptive reuse and rehabilitation project began, overseen by Michael Haslett, as a part of the Hotel del Coronado's master development plan, that included interior renovations and structural upgrades.
SOHO's People In Preservation Awards will be held on Thursday, May 27 as a virtual event. Find the digital awards ceremony HERE.
For more information about SOHO visit SOHOsandiego.org.
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