Places are designed with purpose, though people may not often see it. Charles Birnbaum, president and CEO of The Cultural Landscape Foundation, wants to change that:
“One of the things we like to do,” he said, “is make the often invisible hand of the landscape architect visible.”
To bring the local landscape into sharper focus, TCLF is offering free, expert-led tours of two dozen places around San Antonio this weekend. What’s Out There Weekend San Antonio features deep-dive guided tours of 24 landmarks around the city. Local experts will take visitors around such significant spots as Brackenridge Park, Hemisfair, San Antonio National Cemetery, and more on Saturday and Sunday. Tours are free, but registration is required as space is limited. Register online for tours here.
The tour guides are people with deep knowledge of San Antonio and its notable sites. They include architect Boone Powell and Trinity University art and art history professor Kathryn O’Rourke, who will explain the landscape legacy of Trinity. Landscape architect John Troy and Claire Alexander will showcase the San Antonio Botanical Garden, while Confluence Park Director Frates Seeligson will lead a tour of the site. Each tour’s guides are listed on the weekend’s schedule.
The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) has brought What’s Out There Weekend events to cities nationwide and to Canada. In a project that’s been a year in the making, TCLF partnered with the City of San Antonio to bring it here for San Antonio’s Tricentennial.
The mission of the nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., is to connect people with places, according to TCLF’s website. Birnbaum said doing so is important to preserving a place’s future.
“The more you understand the stories of these places, the better you are able to take care of them,” Birnbaum said.
What’s Out There Weekend events are one of the foundation’s most popular programs, Birnbaum said.
“It appeals to people who are new to the city, to people who are tourists visiting,” he said. “But it’s also really popular with local residents. They often find out something new about a place they often move through every day and never knew it.”
As with each city to which TCLF brings a What’s Out There Weekend event, printed guides of San Antonio are available for purchase. You can also access the guide online here.
TCLF also has a searchable database of North American landscapes with more than 2,000 entries compiled by academics, volunteers, advocates, researchers, and historians. Explorers can also try the foundation’s What’s Nearby function, which uses GPS to search for notable landscapes in your vicinity.
What’s Out There San Antonio starts Friday evening with an opening reception at The Public Theater San Antonio, previously known as the San Pedro Playhouse, from 6 to 8 p.m.
Thank you for this! I had no idea this was going on. I appreciate that the Rivard Report consistently brings opportunities like this to the reader’s attention!
Very disappointed that this was not mentioned earlier. I’m just now reading about it and missed a chance to do some of the Sat tours.
Great initiative:
To start, I highly recommend (even without a tour guide) to visit the following:
San Antonio Museum of Art (free Sundays from 10:00 am to 12:00 pm), Briscoe Museum of Art & River Walk, Tour of Majestic Theatre, Walk Botanical Garden to catch glimpse of LEGO Exhibit, attend an event of ARTS SAN ANTONIO or Musical Bridges Around The World, Visit San Antonio Shoes for a glimpse of their location (vintage cars, Blue Bell Ice Cream & vintage decor), attend a lecture, music event or organ recital at Trinity University, walk on Brackenridge Park, morning coffee at local coffee shops, visit churches to appreciate architecture, Rain to Drain experience by SAWS, visit local galleries.
I wish I had known about the WOTW earlier so I could have signed us up for more tours. As it was, we went to the Opening Reception which was incredible. The Mojo-rimba band was a delightful surprise and my husband and I give kudos to those enthusiastic, talented kids and their teacher. That was a thoroughly enjoyable show. The tapas were amazing: wild mushroom & onion quesadillas, chicken mole empanadas, and two dessert stations: one with cookies & pastries, the other a doughnut wall and table. Besides that, we learned about The Cultural Landscape Foundation (tclf) which we had never heard of before. TCLF is right up my alley…connecting people to places. Wow! And this whole evening was FREE.
The tours we booked at the last minute were Trinity University (top-notch), CHRISpark (low-key), and Woodlawn Lake Park (a gem of a tour despite cold, misty rain…30 people had signed up, six showed up, but four gave up 20 minutes into the hour-long tour. My husband and I, with 30 years in Oregon under our belts, didn’t let a little rain stop us. We were rewarded with the best butterfly garden tour and education we could have imagined!).
THANK YOU to everyone involved with the WOTF weekend. I’ll be blogging about it!