CityScape: San Diego Architecture’s Orchids & Onions Competition Now Includes Tijuana

When pumpkins appear, Orchids & Onions draws near, as the San Diego Architectural Foundation presents the best and worst of local architecture, landscape architecture, interior design, planning and other aspects of the built environment.

This season, with World Design Capital San Diego Tijuana 2024 winding down, Tijuana is included in O&O for the first time in decades.

Winners won’t be unveiled until the Oct. 3 festivities, but SDAF’S list of nearly 100 nominees contains many fresh ideas and disappointingly few whiffs of designs gone bad.

Among Orchid contenders: Dwellings at Bowery Canyon (MAS) in East San Diego, sand-colored fire-resistant concrete-block buildings around a courtyard, with views of canyon flora and fauna; Fox Point Farms (Steinberg Hart and Tecture, Schmidt Design Group), a sustainable “agrihood” in Encinitas — on land formerly occupied by the Ecke family flower fields — with a regenerative farm, zero-waste restaurant, farm-to-tap organic brewery and coffee roaster, plus a farm-stand market and café; Gravity Heights microbrewery (PGAL) in Mission Valley, with colors and plant forms such as cacti and exotic hanging lights inspired by Tulum and the Yucatán Peninsula.

Other Orchid nominees: the Nash (Studio E Architects), seven stories of mixed-use luxury living along Park Boulevard; several buildings at the University of California, San Diego; the Tower Bar in Tijuana (Marshall Interiors) and restoration of the Lafayette Hotel on El Cajon Boulevard (Post Company); outdoor places such as the nature trail (Spurlock Landscape Architects) at San Diego Natural History Museum; and the Children’s Park in downtown San Diego, along with the 1.3-acre Civita Creekside Park at the Civita development in Mission Valley, with children’s play area, mosaic tilework and stormwater remediation (the latter two projects by Schmidt Design Group).

Recuperación Agua Caliente (“Recovery of Agua Caliente,” by Se Hace Arquitectura/Sharlinee Ceniceros y Tatiana Perez) is the resurrection of Tijuana’s Spanish Colonial resort, after decades in decline. It is nominated in the public policy category, since it was made possible by a rare collaboration among government, donors and arts organizations.

3Roots Community Center (Carlos Architects) is the 7,800-square-foot public heart of a multi-story new residential development in Sorrento Mesa that emphasizes sustainability. The center’s industrial aesthetic is inspired by the quarry which formerly occupied the site. The high gabled roof has a round cutout through which a mature tree rises, and the deep eaves provide shade for outdoor seating in a park-like setting. The eaves also shade a wall of glass that provides natural light to a workout center, expansive atrium and other interior spaces.

Historic preservation is exemplified by Chapman Place in Point Loma Heights (DBRDS) — “where history meets luxury” — the adaptive re-use of a mid-century office building designed by William Krisel, repurposed as luxury residential units, melded with new apartment development.

Also nominated for historic preservation is a La Jolla Shores duplex designed by leading mid-century modernists Lloyd Ruocco and Homer Delawie, updated by preservation architect Ione Stiegler with a second- and third-story addition behind the original front façade, jet-winged roofline and entry courtyard.

The Dual residence (Saen Studio & Design Opera Architects)  in Tijuana is a new building with simple geometric forms and thin vertical louvers. In its proportions and lines, it could be a relative of Delawie and Ruocco’s building.

Only three Onion nominees were made this year, disappointing, since a visit to any San Diego community reveals dozens of candidates.

Onion contenders were led by San Diego’s stormwater infrastructure and management, a double whammy — especially during 2024 deluvial winter — of environmental damage and community blight (mud, floods, ruined buildings).

Also peeled and chopped: North Park/South Park’s intrusive bike lane, a collision course for cyclists, motorists, pedestrians and trash trucks serving the neighborhood; and the “massive monstrosity” of a Captain Morgan rum billboard at the Gaslamp Trolley Station.

Whether or not those behind this year’s Onion nominees  will show up at the awards ceremony is the million dollar question. Props to those who have the humility to be there and gain the motivation to do better.

Information about the event and tickets can be found online.

Dirk Sutro has written extensively about architecture and design in Southern California and is the author of architectural guidebooks to San Diego and UC San Diego. His column appears monthly in Times of San Diego.

CityScape is supported by the San Diego Architectural Foundation, promoting outstanding architecture, landscape, interior and urban design to improve the quality of life for all San Diegans.