Sipping drinks and sharing sushi, a casually dressed crowd gathered for a pop-up event in Tijuana’s well-to-do Colonia Cacho on Thursday. It was the second day of the World Design Festival, and the chairs and tables of Bhumi Restaurant had been pushed aside for an installation by four Tijuana designers dubbed: “El humano y sus cuevas,” or the human and his caves.
Conversations buzzed, and electronic music blared as people took in the display: clay vases with primitive figurines, a chair with blue cushions, a brightly woven rug, wall hangings and a giant orange lampshade.
The gathering was one of more than 100 activities featuring more than 300 designers that took place last week in Tijuana in 40 different venues around the city, the result of a collaboration between Tijuana Design Week and San Diego Tijuana World Design Capital 2024. The purpose: to celebrate design, with its potential to build community, improve lives, and change ways of thinking.
The festival, which ran from May 1 to 5, is one of a series of celebrations being staged on both sides of the border this year as part of World Design Capital activities in the region. Tijuana and San Diego share the first binational designation made by the World Design Organization, a Montreal-based nonprofit that promotes design around the world. The festival has been the most ambitious and most visible collaborative effort since the designation started in January.
The program touched on a wide range of themes – from photography and fashion to food design, migration, typography and video games. The schedule included lectures by prominent designers from several countries, workshops, dance performances and a concert featuring musicians from both sides of the border. Throughout, a half a dozen design showrooms displayed furniture, leather goods, clothing ceramics, jewelry and clothing.
The festival brought out a side of Tijuana that might surprise San Diegans who haven’t been across for awhile. New restaurants, breweries, cafes, design showrooms, have cropped up. A new generation of designers, artists, chefs is putting its stamp on the city.
“This is an opportunity to showcase what we have in the region,” Katalina Silva, co-founder with Arturo Elenes of Enigma Creative, a Tijuana design and marketing firm that was the driving force behind the week’s activities. With much of the news of the region focused on violence and migration, “this whole other side is also happening, and I think it’s important for those of us in the region to see it,” she told me.
I dropped in on a half-dozen events over a two-day period, crossing paths with artists, professors, students, architects, photographers, designers, and migrant activists. And occasionally people like myself, simply curious about what this was all about.
In the city’s gritty Zona Norte, as part of a tour organized by World Design Capital, I watched toddlers play inside the Bebe Bús, a bus converted into a safe and orderly play space–especially designed for migrant children ages 1 to 3. Operated by Centro32, it travels to different shelters in Tijuana as the need arises.
Later in the evening, I caught up with members of Sketchbook Club Tijuana, a group that meets monthly at Norte Brewing Co. to sketch together against a panoramic view of the border. They weren’t talking much, just quietly leaning over their pads.
A few blocks away, I stepped past a display of miniature ceramic figures – displayed at the old downtown Bujazan theater on Avenida Constitucion. It was the opening of the exhibit, dubbed “Bosque,” intended to evoke a dreamlike forest, the work of artist Fernanda Uribe – born in San Diego, raised in Tijuana and now living in New York City.
“Tijuana has an extraordinary underground vibe to it, it’s constantly changing,” Uribe told me. “Everything that I am, everything that I learned, it’s from here. This is a little piece of sand to express gratitude.”
At the showroom Object, I crossed paths with Ariane Herwig, a graphic designer from San Diego. She and two friends had driven down to Tijuana for the day – her first visit since the Covid-19 pandemic.
We were both in the audience listening to a presentation of “Xochipilli: El Baile Ebrio,” by Martin Levêque, a French artist from Mexico City. It consists of five mobile sculptures made of concrete, metal and gourds, with the stems moving whimsically when touched.
“It’s not only about the art itself, but about the community connection,” Herwig told me. “And in the grand scheme of things, about Tijuana-San Diego coming together, putting this region on the world map.”
Organizers hope such events will create momentum, and extend that togetherness in the years to come.
“It’s not just what happens this year, but what happens afterwards,” said Laura Araujo, chief international affairs officer for San Diego Tijuana World Design Capital 2024. “What are the seeds that have been sown and how are we going to keep the momentum going?”
In Other News
Binational Jazz Festival: Irwin Jacobs, the founding chairman and CEO emeritus of Qualcomm, is donating almost $400,000 to launch the San Diego Tijuana International Jazz Festival and sustain it for three years, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported. The inaugural event, scheduled for Oct. 4-6, has been designated an “impact project” of World Design Capital San Diego Tijuana 2024.
CaliBaja Megaregion call to action: San Diego County and Baja California have a “once-in-a-lifetime nearshoring opportunity,” says a new report issued by two San Diego nonprofits – the Institute of the Americas and Burnham Center for Community Advancement. The report is a “call to action” that stresses opportunities in medical devices, semiconductors, aerospace, and lithium battery/zero emission vehicle manufacturing. But Mexico and Baja California need to address a range of issues, the report states. These include strengthening the regulatory framework, improving security and rule of law, and ensuring water supplies.
Mexico Elections: Mexico’s presidential election is June 2 – less than a month away. When Baja California voters cast their ballots, they will also be choosing mayors of seven municipalities, and federal and state legislators. The San Diego Union-Tribune reports on how it’s playing out across the border. KPBS looks at how the presidential election will impact the San Diego border region.
Surfer deaths: A memorial paddle-out and a protest took place last weekend in Ensenada following the killing of three men – Australian brothers Callum and Jake Robinson and San Diegan Jack Carter Rhoad – who went missing late last month while on a surfing and camping trip in Baja California. Their bodies were found last week in an abandoned well in a remote area outside Ensenada, and three suspects have been taken into custody. Prosecutors believe the men may have been shot by thieves attempting to steal the tires from their pickup. “The reality of the dangers of travel to and camping in remote areas of Baja are gradually outweighing the benefits,” wrote Ron Hoff, U.S. citizen living in Baja California wrote in a posting on Talk Baja, a Facebook page he administers.
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