House & Garden Tour
By Jennifer Hamilton

House & Garden Tour
Sun, Jan 13, Noon
Doors open at 11am
Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
US$15 or 150 pesos
Breakfast at Café Santa Ana begins at 9am

Tour visitors will be happy that two of the three homes shown today are colonials, next door to each other in Centro. We would like to tour colonials every week, but there just aren’t enough left.

First House

Architect Eduardo Arias designed this 2007 home on several easily-accessible levels. The exterior entrance is a circular stairway that leads to a Mexican desert garden with a rock-surrounded pond and drought-resistant plants.

The interior entrance features an extraordinary bóveda tunnel which leads to a spiral stairwell into the main house. The entryway floor is inlaid in stone with a sun and moon, a theme reflected throughout the house. Some of the artwork is the creation of the owners, who are master watercolorists and photographers. But the piéce de resistance is a powerful 5 x 7-foot marble work enhanced with dragonflies and fossils, created by master artist Antonio Ehrenzweig of León. Positioned beneath an arched skylight, the piece changes hues depending on the position of the sun. 

The upstairs staircase is softly curved and winds sinuously down to the lowest level. Glass stairway and bathroom ceilings add extra light. A bridge, taken whimsically from the design of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera’s home in Mexico City, connects the master bedroom to the studio.

Second house 

All rooms in this spectacular 300-year-old restored colonial home face a landscaped patio, complete with a cantera fountain. The formal living/dining room features 15-foot ceilings and oversized chandeliers. A large colonial painting of the “prophecy” adorns the top of the enormous cantera fireplace, flanked by shelves displaying contemporary and antique ceramics from the region.

Modern and antique furniture and accessories are complemented by paintings and collages by Lari Pittman and Roy Dowell, and by three Eva Chapman watercolors from the early 1900s. The mesquite dining table is the work of a local craftsman. The five bedrooms are all exquisitely furnished with contemporary and antique furniture and accessories. A spacious family room (probably added in the early 1800s) contains lithographs by Roy Dowell. The kitchen was originally the stable that led directly to Calle Correo a block away and is now cheerfully decorated with blue and white tiles, local ceramics and a beautifully tiled stove hood. A pleas
ant, covered ramada and views over most of San Miguel’s church domes complete this stunning and authentic casa.

Third house 

One of San Miguel’s finest historic homes, this magnificent colonial masterpiece featured in several magazines is located near El Jardín.

Built in 1740, it has been home to many prominent people, including Santa Ana during his fifth presidency in 1833, and is thus named in his honor. Like many colonial buildings in San Miguel, the house has an escape tunnel (now sealed) leading to La Parroquia, which was used during the Mexican Revolution. The house fell into ruins until 1985 when it was renovated and opened as a hotel. In 1994, Olga Adriana, colonial architect and former director of the Historical Society, further restored Casa Santa Ana over a two-year period, preserving its colonial integrity and retaining its old-world charm. The first floor has a cochera (parking area) with large, original doors as well as a “Judas” walk-through door. The owner was a lifetime collector and patron of the arts and her paintings, drawings and sculptures remain in the house. The comedór contains a beautiful old cantera porta
l which originally led to the then-existing chapel. The back patio is now a small sala which contains the only remaining original floors of the property.