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The Burgo of San Cernin seen from the sky

Posted on 25/04/2017

A special walk

Discovering the old town of Pamplona can be done in one day, one morning, even in just one hour. Everything depends on the amount of time and interest you may have. It is very possible that anyone who discovers the city and walks up the Curia street, when arriving to the White Horse, stays a long, very long time there, especially if the weather helps. Enjoy the views and the Mesón, open to Pamploneses as well as to outsiders. You can check the website of the inn here.

It’s fair to say that the boroughs of Pamplona/Iruña well deserve a close visit. To know more about this topic, click here and take a look, there is even a bar called the burgos of Iruña. This is your web to go.

We dedicated one morning to the Burgo de San Cernin. And we did it in a special way, gazing at it from the heights.

A rooftop at Ansoleaga Street

A friend of mine told me that the views from her rooftop were beautiful, and I didn’t think about it twice. I asked her to let me in with the kids in order to see San Saturnino from an unusual perspective. From there St. Cernin, as this church is also known, majestically imposed above the city.

Contemplating face to face the roofs of the building of the current library of the Plaza de San Francisco was another gift of that morning. It was once the building of “The Agricultural” as an initiative of the Banking and Insurance Society of the same name.

Afterwards, we admired the Grand Hotel, an imposing building, with history, a public library where we entered today and possibly left without asking about the origin of the property.

Seeing the beautiful courtyard of the Chamber of Comptos from the heights was also a huge delight. A privileged venue to look at this place and briefly review the history of the building.

A book by Fermín Erbiti

“The Chamber of Comptos. Stories Of The Oldest House In Pamplona And Its Surroundings” is a magnificent book. With 163 pages and many photographs, it narrates in a pleasant way the interesting trajectory of the building of the Chamber of Comptos, the institution as such, and many anecdotes of the whole environment. That book served as a guide to make this visit. I recommend everyone to read this. The multiple and varied uses of the oldest civil building in Pamplona, a disappeared palace that used to be where we now see the backs of the Hotel Maisonnave, include the history of a chacolí, the seat of the Pamplona orfeón and many more curiosities can be read in this entertaining and well-documented work of Erbiti.

The church of San Cernin

Also known as the church of San Saturnino in Pamplona. This visit was also very peculiar. Above all, it consisted of comparing the Gothic church with the Barroque chapel. What did you notice? Did you observe differences between one space and another?

What does each one suggest to you? It was a way of approaching the Gothic and the Barroque from an experience and a personal observation. In general, everyone preferred the Gothic style.

An opportunity for photography

It was a great day for Borja Centenera. He was able to take advantage and get into those nooks only suitable for photographers. All the images he captured are beautiful and mesmerizing. Another opportunity to experience in photography, to be amazed while exploring spaces.

Finish on the cover

After visiting the church, we took advantage of the end of our visit, with less people in the street to appreciate the cover in detail. All of them noticed something they had not noticed other times: the remains of polychrome on the stone figures. It invites us to imagine how color must have been in so many medieval temples.

We finished the morning, recovering strength enjoying a few pintxos. Content and certainly surprised by everything that a city tells us about itself. And from now on we have a commitment: to listen, to observe and walk slowly through its streets without assuming that we already know everything.

There can always be surprises. Always. I invite you to walk slowly around Pamplona and each and every one of the cities in which you live and from where you read me. Happy day.

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A talk about the walls of Pamplona

Posted on 11/04/2017

On Saturday March 25 we had the pleasure of receiving Esther Elizalde among us. At the informal dinner, she talked about the demolition of the walls of Pamplona. ({Part of the walls. Thank Good we still have some beautiful walls).

Mrs. Elizalde did her doctoral thesis on this subject. Nevertheless, her speech was not a technical one, just for engineers, architects or historians. Her achievement goes way beyond these people: as a high school teacher, she knows how to deal with any kind of public. And indeed, Esther offered a great biographical note from the people living at the beginning of the 20th Century in Pamplona. She perfectly transmitted the fears, hopes, difficulties and anecdotes from the time of our great-grandfathers. So we were listening about the human side of the walls.

” First Ensanche” of Pamplona

For those who at the beginning of January went to the visit to the “First Ensanche” of Pamplona, this talk became more interesting. They had experienced the fist area built with the goal of giving people from Pamplona a little more space, but it was not enough at all. Moreover, it was only for very well off people.

One of the facts that made the dinner so interesting was the amount of pictures brought from the municipal archive of Pamplona that we had the chance to enjoy.

The pity, as always happens with informal dinners and talks; was that there was not way to display a great number of pictures from the activity on the blog .

But, if you are in Pamplona, the visit to the archive is free and worthy, here you have the information about it:

On behalf of the people who joined us that day, I want to thank Esther for coming. She had the kindness of attending us coming to Pamplona from Zaragoza and spending her free time of a Saturday evening with students and young professionals of Patrimonio para Jóvenes.

Before you come to Pamplona, have a look to the web with information about the walls of the city and the great walks you can have all around.

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FASHION ON THE RETROCHOIR

Posted on 04/04/2017

Have you ever been at the Burgos Cathedral? It is a great monument, with an “unmistakable profile” (as it’s said on Wikipedia) that is well worth visiting. It is so big, so majestic, and so outstanding, that you can easily get overwhelmed by so much beauty. In consequence, you can take for granted a lot of important details.

An example of these overseen jewels is the retrochoir, right in front of the wonderful chapel of Condestables. It’s a shame that people don’t spend enough time there to pay attention to this masterpiece of sculpture. If you want more information about the artist and his work go here

Consuelo Sanz de Bremond LLoret, a specialist on antique clothing was the one who proposed talking about fashion on the retrochoir. Specifically, hat fashion. In fact, most of the characters seen here are wearing hats with such charm and delicacy that they can easily inspire fashion nowadays.

This observation let us organize the creativity practice we proposed to the pupils at the Art and Design School in Burgos: To create new models of hats for today based on those we can see at the retrochoir . And we hope they make it!

With this event, we wanted to introduce in an official way Patrimonio para Jóvenes at the city of Burgos. Even if we displayed some activities before, we have never had a formal introduction.

During the days before, and even the very day of this event, it was broadcasted on newspapers, radio and TV. Check out if you want here (go to 17,30 program time)

On behalf of the team of Patrimonio para Jóvenes, I want to thank Consuelo for joining us at Burgos and for her dedication of more than three months to study carefully each model on each head of the characters.

After the talk, everybody has learnt how to look at a retrochoir with a new point of view. First the superb scene of the life of Christ : The road to the Calvary, and more scenes from the passion. And more important, we discovered how carefully Felipe Vigarny described each person at the story by drawing amazing faces, amazing clothes and charming and sometimes exotic hats.

Welcome to the Cathedral of Burgos and get ready to take off your hat!

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Historicism in Burgos/ another view of Burgos

Posted on 07/03/2017

When visiting Burgos, it is quite normal to visit the most important places of the city, as the cathedral, the old town, the monastery of “Las Huelgas” and even “La Cartuja”. In fact, the artistic heritage of the city and its beautiful surroundings are so stunning that is not easy to have time for more. Even for some people living in Burgos, some part of the heritage could be underestimated. Or at the very least not well known.

Paseo de la Isla and its sorroundings

This is something I experienced when walking with the team around the “Paseo de la Isla” and its surroundings, an area of the city with great examples of Historicism. Moreover; there is a very interesting example of neo renaissance architecture by architects Apraiz and Luque. We talked about them at the beginning of the year, in Vitoria. If you want to read more about our visit to the Augustin Zulueta residence and Vitoria´s Neo gothic cathedral, click here

Enrique Jerez and Arturo González

Enrique Jerez in Burgos had a surprise for us. Before our visit, he had asked Arturo González to join us. Arturo is one of the architects in charge of the rehabilitation of the episcopal palace. He explained to us what they did in order to find a totally new and functional use of the building. All, without losing the essential style given by Apraiz and Luque at the beginning of XXth century

Stairs and stained glass windows

We could compare the entrance and stairs of the episcopal palace in Burgos with the one we visited in Vitoria. Which one do you like the most? The one made of marble in Burgos or the wooden one from Vitoria? Why? What kind of atmospheres are created by such different materials?

While in Burgos, we also saw stained glass windows located in the right in the middle of the principal stairs, just like the ones we saw in Vitoria. In fact, the stained glass came from the same craftsman workshop: Maumejean, one of the most important workshops in France and even in Spain during those years.

Due to our very well explained visit to the palace with Arturo, we didn´t have a lot of time to see more buildings. So, we will have to come back in spring! With good weather and in broad daylight, I am sure we will enjoy places such as the palace of the island, the one you can see on the following picture;

We also visited “Las Salesas” a convent close to the building we visited before. Las salesas is a great example of Neo-gothic in Burgos. Built by Lamperez, it is an example of the power that Gothic aesthetic has always influenced Burgos. In fact, remember the Cathedral: Its gothic style is a symbol and icon, a legend, something that becomes a milestone. I posted some pictures on Facebook, and you can check out its website.

Las Salesas also counts with beautiful stained glasses, remembering the ones from the middle age despite being made nowadays. Well, one hundred years ago… but not centuries ago…

For the next walk we will also see the Capitanía General, another example of Neo Gothic style, only this time it is not a religious building but a civil one.

Afterwards, the team had a pic-nic at the little village of Vivar del Cid. There they visited the mural painting that Patrimonio para Jóvenes sponsored some years ago. The painting was explained by one of the artists, Sergio Rodrigo Andrade.

Well, it was a great visit. But we left very nice places outstanding… Until the next time!!!

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At the batán of Villava

Posted on 21/02/2017

Today I have the pleasure to invite you to follow us in a very simple, but nice visit to the Batan of Villava. A visit that is linked to the ethnography , brotherhood, ancient jobs and economy development tha occurred in towns close to rivers.

A batan was a machine used in other times that worked with the power of water and was used to beat textiles and prepare them for different uses. The evidence of the ancient use of this machine is its mention and protagonism in one of the famous adventures of Don Qujote de la Mancha.

Villava is a nice village that is just a ten-minute drive away from Pamplona. You can also go walking and enjoy the beauty of the river park of Pamplona. Click here for further information

Landscapes, history, World heritage sites, and industrial heritage, all together in just one morning. Right next to the Batan (the building which has inside the machine has the same name: batán) is the Arre bridge , crossed by all the pilgrims coming from Zubiri and hading to Santiago, and the old Romanic apse from the church of Trinidad of Arre.

The Batán has more things to show. We saw with Ekaitz the map of the waterway around Pamplona, and we learned the history of the batan, how it worked, and indeed how it works today. Ekaitz set in motion for us the machine . We had information about the people who worked there, and watched a video about the history of Pamplona and its relation with rivers and water.

Another important point of this visit was to understand how important are rivers and water for habitability and civilization. Romans who founded Pompaelo, shepherds, timber merchants, pilgrims… a great history of people, masters, and culture around the river

If you are in Pamplona or nearby, you can go there, the visit is free and is held in Spanish or Euskera, however, you can also visit it by yourself. Not far away is the San Andrés mill, another nice place to see. In summer you can also enjoy an open air cafetería, right in the middle of the nature and on the Way of Saint James.

Either in winter or in summer, we can always go around and know more about our heritage. The big one, the small one, but always our heritage.

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Walk through Pamplona

Posted on 31/01/2017

Some years ago, the Chicago Tribune published an article about the city of Pamplona. The article went beyond the traditional topic of Sanfermines and talked about another interesting places around the city. If you want to read the complete article, please click here

Having this article on mind, I am writing about the last morning we went for a walk around Pamplona. We may have not seen all the city since it took us just one hour, and we visited just some streets, but it was totally worth it, so follow us and take a look of what we saw.

We visited some buildings of an area of Pamplona called I Ensanche. The word Ensanche could be more or less translated to “expansion”, therefore, it was the first expansion of the city. Now you may ask yourself why are we talking about “expansion”? Well, because of the walls surrounding the city. Until the last century, Pamplona was a city completely surrounded by a stone fortress. Nowadays despite it still has some remaining walls, the city has grown out of those edges. So, back then, the city was completely different from what we can appreciate today.

The first expansion was the first area where wealthy people could build elegant houses made by the most important architects of the end of XIXth Century and beginnings of the XXth Century. A public building, the palace of justice, was built at the same time as well.

Regrettably, some of those houses were demolished and today we can´t enjoy watching all of them. However, around this area there are still some amazing examples of the detail-oriented and versatile styles that define the architecture of that time. For example, it’s impossible to avoid looking at the beautiful buildings by Manuel Martinez Urbago in Modernist style. The team was astonished by the beauty of the gantries and overwhelmed by the delicacy of every little piece that decorated the room. The details and harmony in those spaces suddenly let us delightfully experience an atmosphere from other times.

We also enjoyed watching at the only house of Pamplona that is built in neo-mudéjar style. In the case of this particular building, materials are essential, since bricks are not only for used construction, but also for the decoration of its facade. With contrasting colors, geometric shapes and a harmonic combination of the bricks with the rest of materials, this is a beautiful creation that effortlessly stands out from the surrounding houses.

In the end, we spent such a nice morning contemplating all the ornamental details, admiring the sinuous beauty of each façade, balcony or hall, reconstructing the ancient majesty of those houses in our minds, and chatting about the historicist and eclectic style in Spain, that the time passed so fast we didn´t notice.

Each of us also learnt a little more about the city of Pamplona. We realized that knowing well a city is not as easy as it sounds. It does not matter if it is a small city or even if we have been living there for several years, there are always secret spots or hidden treasures that need just a little of attention to be discovered and admired.

This morning walk was totally worth it. It was a morning for learning to look at the beauty of a city. Cities do not need to be enormous nor monumental to please our sight with lovely spaces. Each of them has a past that defines it, a need for beauty that decorates it and a will to become a nice place to live in that shapes it. With this walk along the secret beauties of Pamplona, we learned that each city possesses a charm, a history and a heritage that must be enjoyed, preserved and given to the next generations for their own delight.

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Good morning Vitoria!

Posted on 17/01/2017

There are cities in Spain with a kind of magnet for foreign people. A magnet generated by their fame, product of their world reputation and a great marketing strategy perhaps, that create on you the need to tell you have been there.

Nevertheless, there are amazing cities, secret treasures well worth to visit that don´t get the attention they truly deserve.

Vitoria is a nice, beautiful place that’s worth the time you need to walk around its streets. It counts with great promenades, an interesting old town, the great Basque cuisine to delight all tastes, two cathedrals (an old and a new one) and a great offer of public museums.

At the beginning of January, we went to the Fine Arts Museum of this lovely city and we had a morning full of fun, not only in the museum but along our way as well: the road to the museum is through a great park surrounded by beautiful houses with rich ornaments, like one known as “Casa de las Jaquecas“ which translates to “the House of Migraines” due to the body expression of the sculptures that decorate its facade.

Once in the Museum, we had the opportunity to appreciate its interesting permanent collection, with paintings by Dario de Regoyos, Antonio Maria de Lecuona, Zuloaga, Madrazo, among many others, and an area dedicated to Fernando Amarica.

What makes this place even more interesting, is that the museum itself, is a stunning building. “…A grand residence commissioned by husband and wife Ricardo Augustin and Elvira Zulueta, and designed by the architects Javier Luque and Julian Apraiz in 1912 and finished at 1916“as it’s explained on the Museum´s brochure. It is a sumptuous and elegant construction in a historicist style with many details to be appreciated. If you want to know more about the museum, click on this link

Our visit to the Museum this time was focused on the house and the historicist style. Everybody enjoyed exploring the rooms, contemplating the chapel and got stunned by the beauty of the fine joinery all around the rooms, on ceilings and floors, that can´t stop calling for your attention.

Then, in order to make our visit more dynamic, we formed groups of three or four people, each group had to select two paintings from all the collection and afterwards, explain to the other groups the reasons of their choice

After we were done with our visit, we went to eat some “pinchos” or “tapas” and later we visited the great new cathedral, an impressive example of Neo Gothic construction that just like the museum, emphasized the protagonist role of historicist architecture in this trip.

During this year, at Patrimonio para Jovenes, we will be talking again about historicist style, an architectonic style loved by some people, and very despised by others. Feel free to choose by yourself, but in the meantime, don’t forget to visit Vitoria!

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Integration through cultural heritage

Posted on 22/11/2016

During the summer our association kept in touch with Core, a foundation located in Pamplona, Navarra. The purpose of Core is to help integrate the emigrants in the region of Navarra.

Our proposal was an collaborative activity: a trip together to the famous “Venta de Ulzama” .

What Ventas de Ulzama is:

Along with its beautiful surroundings, it is a typical country house which was built in 1840 by the Town Hall of the Ultzama Valley. Its aim was to host all those tired and hungry travelers that would stop for a rest. Read more here.

Today it is famous for its deserts, Cuajada and Canutillos. There is a kind of custom of going to the Ultzama with family or just with friends for a supper and sweets.

So it was interesting to offer this visit to the cooking class at Core Foundation. It was an occasion to discover landscape, local architecture, and gastronomy. It was an experience of cultural heritage in a very nice way.

We decided that autumn would be a good time for the visit so we went at the beginning of November.

The trip and the supper

It was such a pity that it was raining! Anyway, the half an hour we had from Pamplona to the Ultzama was nice. Children were so excited on the way watching cows, sheep and deer. The colour of the forest and the great smell of wet earth were also a nice experience.

In spite of the rain, everybody enjoyed some time feeding the deer. Though niether me nor Borja could take good photos. It was raining a lot and the water was dangerous for cameras. In any case, here you have an example.

Inside the restaurant we test first the Cuajada.

The Cuajada is a dairy product made of ewe’s milk. Inma, the lady in charge of the Venta de Ultzama explained to everybody in a very friendly and simple way the recipe and the origin of this dessert.

We also tasted Canutillos, with a delicious custard cream. During the supper we had the opportunity to talk each other and get to know about the countries that everyone was from.

During this week, the people who attended the cooking course at Core are going to prepare cuajada and canutillos by themselves. Here you have the team at Core Foundation

At Patrimonio para Jovenes, we had the job to introduce to our gastronomy, customs, and culture to all these new friends who have arrived to Navarra.

And this bring us to the end of the blog until January. Have a good Christmas Holiday!

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Again on the Way of St James

Posted on 15/11/2016

Before finishing the year 2016, we have two activities you can read about on the blog. And today, you have our visit to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, a charming village at the Region of La Rioja, on the Way of Saint James.

Santo Domingo is famous because it’s on the Camino, and for its markets, cultural events and of course the cathedral, Domingo the Saint, and the legend of Hen and Rooster Miracle . Click on the link and you can read more about it. In fact, in Spain we say “donde cantó la gallina después de asada” “where the roosters crow after being roasted”.

The Henhouse inside the Cathedral keep the attention of visitors and is fun for the children.

A stunning altarpiece

At the beginning of the trip we weren’t thinking of visiting all of the cathedral, but at least, the most interesting things. But the awesome altarpiece made by Damian Forment kept our attention most of the time. It doesn’t matter. It is a good excuse to come back only to visit the Romanesque capitals and presbytery.

In any case, I asked some questions to the boys in order to have them observe and come to conclusions by themselves.

Faces, bodies, characters, the way sculptures are painted, and all the story told on the alterpiece made us spend so much time just looking carefully at it.

What a pity the light!

The inside of the cathedral is not an easy place for photos. Here you have some nice ones, but perhaps next time Víctor has to use a tripod in order to have a good illumination all around.

Thanks to Father Merino

We thank Father Merino who helped during the visit. He also gave us the opportunity to visit the sacristy and some details of the sculptures of the doors. And then we had a very nice surprise: because Christmastime is not very far away, we had the opportunity to enjoy the Great Christmas Nativity scene, with hundreds of little sculptures, dressed on typical costumes, masters.

If you have the chance to visit Santo Domingo during Christmastime, definitely take it! And don’t miss the nativity display which is also great for children.

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Looking at an altarpiece through the fashion

Posted on 08/11/2016

The story of this post has its beginning on Internet. I’d known Consuelo Sanz de Bremond and her blog Indumentaria y vida cotidiana en España on Twitter and Facebook. Then we were emailing each other, and finally, I met her last summer in a village close to Madrid.

I wished the team of Patrimonio para jovenes could take a special visit to the stunning altarpiece of San Julian de Ororbia.

Ororbia is a village located just 15 minutes from Pamplona by car. And the altarpiece is one of the most interesting in Navarra. It was a pity that there was poor lighting which made picture taking difficult this time

The way we chose ( Consuelo and I ) to see the altarpiece was through the point of view of fashion – fashion at the beginning of the XVI century. The alterpiece of Ororbia offers great information not only about dresses but also about the way of life of the people from this time.

During the morning we visited the altarpiece at Ororbia. There, everybody had time not only to understand the artwork, but to take their own photos as well. This is very important. Taking photos, even if they are taken with the mobile phones, means that they offer a personal point of view about the art.

In the evening, we had an informal dinner and chat. Consuelo, with a Power Point presentation, talked to us in a very friendly way about fashion and showed us how the old times have their influence on fashion today.

To prepare this power point, Consuelo had the great help of Borja Centenera. This summer he went to take photos very carefully and with plenty of detail of the caps, hats, and shoes that Consuelo asked for.

We also had a workshop with fabric swatches. By touching silk, sheep wool, mohair, velvet and other swatches, the team could think and experience different textures and imagine their uses.

At the dinner, we were joined by the very nice people of Ororbia, that during these past months had helped us prepare this activity.

If you are coming to Pamplona, don’t forget visit this area. Orobia is close to the interesting church of Santa Maria of Gazolaz, and the Otazu Winery, an area with a great landscape, heritage and lots of fun.

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