Category Archives: Ancestral Houses

Malacanang of the North (Paoay, Ilocos Norte)

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Malacanang ti Amianan

After our short stopover at Paoay Lake in Paoay, we now proceeded to the two-storey Malacanang ti Amianan (Malacañang of the North), one of the 29 former vacation houses of the Marcoses.  This was to be our last Lakbay Norte 2 tourist destination. Located uphill, on the first road past the Maharlika Hall of Fort Ilocandia Resort Lake Golf and Country Club, this hardwood mansion was built in 1977 by former First Lady Imelda Marcos, along the edge of Paoay Lake, to commemorate the 60th birthday of the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos and as a vacation home and cabinet meeting place.

The baby grand piano beside the grand staircase

After the Marcoses lost power in 1986, the property was sequestered and the Philippine Tourism Authority was given custodianship of the property for 24 years but had neglected its upkeep.  When Imee Marcos became governor of Ilocos Norte in 2010, she had the house restored at a cost of PhP7 million and inaugurated it again on January 1, 2011. During the restoration, all the wooden furniture sets and fixtures were reupholstered or repaired. Now a museum and a venue for grand weddings, private functions and corporate and theme events, it has a photo gallery of the late president  and displays some of the personal belongings of the Marcoses, life-size Ferdinand Marcos mannequins and Congresswoman Imelda’s Cora Jacob arm candy and other clutches.

Life-size Ferdinand Marcos mannequins

The museum was supposed to be closed during our visit, it being a Monday, but our media group was given special permission to visit by the provincial government.  Ms. Letty Buduan, who served the Marcoses for over three decades, and seven others keep the museum spic and span.  The narra floors were so shiny and the furniture dust-free.  In the past, visitors here included George Hamilton, Nora Aunor, Gabby Concepcion, among others.  Nowadays, bus loads of school children and guests frequent this museum which offers a breathtaking and panoramic view of Paoay Lake, especially during sunset.

Formal dining area

This huge, 1,900 sq. m. mansion, on a  roughly 4 hectare lot, has nine luxurious bedrooms, two living rooms, two formal dining areas, two kitchens and two verandahs. Imelda Marcos’ bedroom, the largest of the nine, displays some of her handbags.  Imee and Irene shared a bedroom while Bongbong’s and the late president’s master bedroom were both located at the ground floor.  They all slept in canopied beds.  A baby grand piano is located by the staircase.

The verandah with its panoramic view of Paoay Lake

After our Malacanang ti Amianan Museum visit, we all boarded our bus as we headed back to Laoag City for our 9:30 PM return flight back to Manila.  But first, we had dinner at Texicano Hotel and there, said goodbye to our gracious hosts, the Ilocos Norte Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Malacanang ti Amianan: Brgy. Suba, Paoay, Ilocos Norte. Open Tuesdays to Sundays, 9 AM-11:30 PM.  Admission fee: PhP30 for adults and PhP10 for children.

Ilocos Norte Convention and Visitors Bureau: Room 2, Balay da Blas, 10 Giron St., Brgy. 7-B, Laoag City, Ilocos Norte.  Mobile number: (0920) 269-1544.  E-mail: stevebarreiro@yahoo.com.  Website: http://northphilippines.org/destinations/ilocos-norte.

Marcos Museum and Mausoleum (Batac City, Ilocos Norte)

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Marcos Museum and Mausoleum

We were now on our last day of our 6-day North Philippines Visitors Bureau (NPVB)/Manila North Tollways Corp. (MNTC)-sponsored Labay Norte 2 media tour and, after our Playa Tropical Resort Hotel presscon in Currimao, we returned again to the Ilocos Norte Hotel and Convention Center for lunch and another presscon, this time with former presidential daughter and now Ilocos Norte Gov.  Maria Imelda “Imee” R. Marcos.   After that, we proceeded to nearby Batac City to visit the Marcos Museum and Mausoleum and the Imelda Marcos Gallery.  This would be my second visit to the former and my first to the latter. A few meters from the museum is the Romanesque-style Church of the Immaculate Conception. 

The presidential table

The Marcos Museum and Mausoleum was the colonial-style, wood and adobe boyhood ancestral home of the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos who moved to Batac from Sarrat when he was 8 years old.  Housing the memorabilia of the former president, this modest, 3-room museum has a wall dedicated to Marcos’ wartime service in the Philippine Army, as a soldier in the defense of Bataan and with American Forces after liberation. There are also photos of him and Imelda, his military awards, his letters, important documents, license plates of his cars, the bust of the president and his work desk at Malacanang. At the second floor are the offices of former presidential children Ferdinand “Bongbong” E. Marcos, Jr. (now a senator) and Gov. Imee R. Marcos when they were Second District congressmen. 

Imelda Marcos Residence

On the right side of the house is the Marcos Mausoleum where the glass-encased, embalmed corpse of the late president lies, since 1993, in a vacuum-sealed, refrigerated crypt.  Marcos died in exile in Hawaii on September 28, 1989 and his body was brought to his hometown in Batac while awaiting a state funeral at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.  The president is dressed in a white barong tagalog with a red, white and blue ceremonial sash and polished medals. The dimly lit interior is filled with piped-in soft Gregorian chant music. Visitors are not allowed to take pictures inside.  I guess the only time photos were ever taken of Marcos’ corpse was when former First Lady and Imelda R. Marcos visited it for some publicity shots.

Marcos Photo Gallery

Also within the compound is another ancestral house used as the office of now Second District congresswoman Imelda Marcos.  We also dropped by the nearby Marcos Photo Gallery (World Peace Center), a 200-photo archive of the Marcos family. They include a collage of news clippings and photos during the Marcos era.  Prior to leaving Batac City for Paoay, I bought a cowboy hat (PhP150) at one of the sidewalk stalls and tried out the Batac empanada. 

Marcos Museum and Mausoleum: Marcos Ave., Batac City, Ilocos Norte. Open daily, 9 AM- 12 noon and 1-4 PM. 

Marcos Museum (Sarrat, Ilocos Norte)

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Marcos Museum

After our lunch and church visit at Paoay, we again boarded our bus for Sarrat, the birthplace of the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos.  Our first stop was, fittingly, the Marcos Museum.  The museum, overlooking the Padsan River, is actually the Edralin house where Marcos was born on September 11, 1917 to Mariano and Josefa Edralin Marcos, both school teachers from well-to-do families.  He lived here until he was 8 years old when his family moved to Batac.  

The museum’s ground floor

The house then was a traditional 2-storey bahay na bato, with a red brick ground floor for storage and the wooden upper level, with its hardwood floor, reserved for the living quarters.  It was renovated by  First Lady Imelda R. Marcos in 1977, the president’s  60th birthday, but was left abandoned after the fall of the Marcos before being restored again.   Many of the items on display were taken from the Malacanang Palace Museum as well as from the Malacanang of the North in Paoay.   

The museum’s second floor

On display are the 4-poster bed where Marcos was born, the old clock set to the time of his birth, the many barong tagalogs he wore on different occasions, musical instruments (harp, piano, etc.), many old photographs of the family, busts of Don Mariano and Dona Josefa Marcos, the license plates Marcos used for his cars, the Marcos family tree on the wall facing the stairs, as well as documents and old furniture (the escrihana used by Don Fructuoso Edralin y Carpio, the presidents grandfather, when he was vice-gobernadorcillo; the president’s swivel chair, aparadors, etc.).

Marcos Museum: Brgy. San Agustin, Sarrat, Ilocos Norte.  Open Mondays-Saturdays, 8 AM-12 noon and 2-5 PM.

Reminiscing in San Miguel de Mayumo (Bulacan)

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Church of St. Michael the Archangel

We were now on the final leg on our Lakbay Norte 2 tour and our final destination was the marble quarrying, first-class municipality of San Miguel de Mayumo, a town rich in history within the equally historic province of Bulacan.   Our special Victory Liner bus first dropped us off at the Church of St. Michael the Archangel where we were welcomed by Mr. Jose G. Clemente and Ms. Amelia Aquino, both of the Bulacan Tourism Convention and Visitors Bureau (BTCVB); Mr. Jimmy Corpuz, head of the National Historic Conservation Society; and municipal tourism officer Ms. Divina Quetua.  This Baroque-style church, with its statue of St. Michael the Archangel slaying the dragon at the center panel of the pediment, was built (or rebuilt) in 1848 by Fr. Juan M. Tombo and was completed in 1869 by Fr. Francisco Arriola.  Maximo Viola, the financier of the printing of Rizal’s Noli me Tangere, is buried in a vault within the church.  After the church tour, we all cross the street to pay a courtesy call on Mayor Roderick Tiongson at the municipal hall (built in 1874). 

Simon Tecson Mansion

Being an hour behind schedule, we had no time to tour, on foot, San Miguel’s 25-30 ancestral houses (the town is called the “Vigan of Bulacan”) scattered around the town proper as we had to drop by Biak-na-Bato National Park, site of the Biak-na-Bato Republic.  These bahay na bato were built with different styles of architecture and colors during the Spanish and American eras, all existing testimonies to the abundance and prosperity of the past. Instead, we did a slow tour via our bus, along the town’s narrow streets, with Mr. Clemente commenting on each house we passed. In the past, landed barons running haciendas in Central Luzon built their grand residences or vacation houses in San Miguel de Mayumo where they hosted lavished parties or soirees.

Bahay Paniki Cave

We arrived at the 2,117-hectare Biak-na-Bato National Park by 5 PM.  Our 1-hr. tour took us past Gen. Aguinaldo Cave (Emilio Aguinaldo‘s headquarters in 1897 and site of the Biak-na-Bato Republic) all the way up to Bahay Paniki Cave, located upstream from the Balaong River.  Probably the largest cave in the area, the cave has a rather deep natural indoor swimming pool fed by an underground stream.  Thousands of fruit bats fly in and out from dawn and dusk but we were not to witness this as approaching darkness would make our return trek difficult.

Lakbay Norte media group with BTCVB

It was already dark when we returned to the park’s new pavilion for a snack of ensaymada (a brioche made with butter and topped with grated cheese and sugar) and arroz caldo (a rice porridge flavored with chicken)  After a short press briefing and photo ops, we all returned to bus for our 2-hr. return trip to Manila.  However, the grateful town and its people wouldn’t let us go without bringing home some pasalubong of the town’s famous delicacies.  Waiting for us at the bus were pastillas de leche (delicious, mouth-watering candy made from sugar and pure carabao’s milk), tableya (old fashion Philippine chocolate), minasa (cassava cookies), yema balls (a sweet custard candy made with condensed milk and egg yolks) and chicharon (fried pork crackling). 

Bulacan Tourism Convention and Visitors Bureau (BTCVB): c/o Ciudad Clemente Resort, Paombong Bulacan.  Mobile number: (0927) 669-5655. E-mail: joclemente01@yahoo.com.

Heritage Walk in the City of San Fernando (Pampanga)

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The turn-of-the-century, Victorian-style Augusto P. Hizon house

On the last day of our 5-day Lakbay Norte 2 media tour, we were to attend a cooking demonstration by local culinary expert and historian Lilian “Atching” M.L. Borromeo in Mexico, Pampanga, but we were early for once so our special Victory Liner media bus made a brief stopover at the provincial capital city of San Fernando, parking along A. Consunji St.  in Brgy. Sto. Rosario.  A number of,Spanish and American-era ancestral houses were located here so much so that a number of us, me included, alighted and made a walking tour for some photo ops while the others stayed in the airconditioned comfort of the bus.

The Lazatin House

The Hizon-Singian House, built in 1870, was occupied during the 1896 revolution by Spanish Gen. Antonio Ruiz Serralde. During World War II, it was used by the Japanese Imperial Army as a military hospital and barracks (1943-44) and, during the liberation period until the end of 1945, served as headquarters of 6th Army of American Gen. Walter Krueger.  The Lazatin residence, built in 1925, exemplifies the architecture prevalent during the American colonial period. During World War II, it served as a residence of Japanese Gen. Masaharu Homma. On January 27, 2003, both houses were declared as Heritage Houses by the National Historical Institute. Other ancestral houses along this street include the Consunji house, the turn-of-the-century, Victorian-style Augusto P. Hizon house and the Pampanga Lodge and Restaurant (the first site of the Pampanga High School when it first opened and, later, of the Harvardian College).

Finally, on my own, I visited the Metropolitan Cathedral of San Fernando, located in front of the City Hall.

Check out “Metropolitan Cathedral of San Fernando“

City Tourism Office: A. Consunji St., Brgy. Sto. Rosario, City of San Fernando, Pampanga.  Tel: (045) 961-5684

The Kamistisuhan Houses of Malolos City (Bulacan)

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From the basilica, we made a walking tour of the city’s Kamistisuhan Houses which are mostly located along Pariancillo St. These houses, built by landed Filipino-Chinese families, typify the intricate architectural design of Spanish buildings.  When Pres. Emilio Aguinaldo moved the seat of government to Malolos, he established the various cabinet offices at these houses. Some of these houses are still inhabited by the descendants of the original owners and in a good state of preservation.  Others have been demolished or have been converted to commercial establishments.

The beautifully restored Adriano-Vasquez Mansion, a perfect example of adaptive reuse, once housed Aguinaldo’s Gobierno Militar de la Plaza.  Now the Meralco Bldg. (Meralco bought it in 1995 and restored it in 1997), it has a filigreed cast iron staircase that wind up to the balustered rampart.

The Adriano House
 The 2-storey Bautista Caryatid House, behind the Adriano House, has ornately sculpted Neo-Classic touches and was built in 1855 and redecorated in 1877 in the French Art Noveau style.  It was the Secretaria de Fomento and home of Antonio Bautista, Aguinaldo’s Secretary of the Interior.  It contains heirloom memorabilia including the original KKK flag and here, Jose Rizal and Marcelo H. del Pilar spoke to the 21 women of Malolos on June 27, 1892.  Through the years, the house has been used as a municipal hall, a primary school and a barracks for Japanese soldiers.  Restored in the 1970s by descendant Basilidez “Dez” Bautista, its ground floor has an arched double door while the second floor’s columns are decorated by unique caryatids.
 
The Bautista Caryatid House 

The Erastro Cervantes House, beside an old movie theater, once housed Aguinaldo’s Department of the Interior.   The Arcadio Ejercito House housed Aguinaldo’s Department of War.  The Lino Reyes House, across the side entrance of the cathedral, once housed Aguinaldo’s Secretaria de Exterior.  Built by couple Lino and Maria Reyes probably after they were married in 1892, it was progressively renovated in the 1930s.  The house has an octagonal rose window and a weather vane on top of the roof.  

A sad case in point is the Ponciano Tiongson House which was demolished in the 1980s.  Formerly located across the Erastro Cervantes House, it had intricate balustered windows and once served as Aguinaldo’s Commisaria de Guerra.  An internet cafe now stands in its place.

The Hermogenes Reyes House

Other ancestral houses were built during the early American era.  The Hermogenes Reyes House, located a few blocks from the cathedral, was built in 1904 by couple Hermogenes and Teodora Reyes.

The gabled roof Lomotan House
The Dr. Luis Santos House, built in 1933 by an EENT doctor, has a spacious front garden with a fountain with a pair of lovely nymphs. The house sports a pastel blue and white, Art-Deco-inspired facade.

Dr. Luis Santos House

Adriano-Vasquez Mansion: Pariancillo St., Malolos City, Bulacan.
Arcadio Ejercito House: cor. Estrella and Pariancillo Sts., Malolos City, Bulacan.
Bautista Caryatid House: Sto. Nino St., Malolos City, Bulacan
Erastro Cervantes House: Pariancillo St.,Malolos City, Bulacan.
Hermogenes Reyes House: F.T. Reyes St. (formerly Calle Electricidad), Brgy. Sto. Nino, Malolos City, Bulacan.
Lino Reyes House: Estrella St., Malolos City, Bulacan.
Lomotan House: Sto. Nino St., Malolos City, Bulacan

Barasoain Church (Malolos City, Bulacan)

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After breakfast and swimming at DJ Paradise Resort & Hotel, Jandy and I checked out of our room, boarded our Toyota Revo and proceeded to the city proper where we plan to visit Malolos’ historical sights.  The first item in our agenda was, fittingly, the Barasoain Church (also called the Church of Our Lady of Carmel), the site of the Revolutionary Congress which ratified independence, framed the Malolos Constitution and inaugurated the short-lived First Philippine Republic (Malolos Republic). Former president Joseph E. Estrada also took his oath of office here.

Barasoain Church

This noble and dignified church, with its beautiful concerto of rhythmic layers, has a Neo-Classical facade with a recessed main entrance with concentric arches (a Romanesque feature) flanked by two smaller doors, fluted  flat pilasters (a Renaissance feature), a Baroque segmental pediment,  and sharp line moldings at the cornice, base and top of the piers.  The two sides of the facade, with its sweeping concave lines at the upper wall, curve inward to form an oval shape.

The altar frontal
The church interior
The church pulpit

Inside is a unique 18th century altar frontal with beautiful stone columns and murals on the walls and ceilings done by Baliwag artists and the National Historical Institute.  The church is now airconditioned during Sunday mass.

The bell tower

The 4-storey, octagonal bell tower on the left, was built in 1889 by Fr. Martin Arconada and is crowned by a conical roof.  It has 3 bells installed in 1897 and has alternating open and false windows rising in uneven modules that end up in the crenellated base of the pointed pinnacle.

Barasoain Convent

Beside the church is the convent.  First built in 1859 by Fr. Francisco Arriola, it was restored in 1889 by Fr. Martin Arconada and in 1894 by Fr. Miguel de Vera.  During the short-lived Philippine Republic, it was again restored by Arcadio Arellano and used as the Universidad Cientifica y Literaria de Filipinas.  It now houses two museums: the Ecclesiastical Museum and the Barasoain Museum.   Both church and convent were declared as National Landmarks on August 1, 1973 and on January 23, 1999.

Carriage used by Pres. Aguinaldo during his inauguration
The convent courtyard
Barasoain Church: Paseo de Congreso, Malolos City, Bulacan.  Tel: (044) 662-7686.

Bernardino-Ysabel Jalandoni Museum (Silay City, Negros Occidental)

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From Balay Negrense, Solo next brought us to the nearby 2-storey Bernardino-Ysabel Jalandoni Museum, beside the City Public Market  and near the San Diego Pro-Cathedral.  Also called the Pink Museum, the house was first owned by Don Bernardino Jalandoni and his wife Dona Ysabel Ledesma-Jalandoni.
Bernardino-Ysabel Jalandoni Museum
Their grandson, Luis Jalandoni, was a former priest who became one of the top leaders of Communist Party of the Philippines.  Since the 1970s, he has been living in exile in the Netherlands.  Luis spent the first 12 years of his life in this house.  The current heirs, Mr. and Mrs. Antonio J. Montinola have entrusted its care to the Silay Heritage Foundation, a non-government organization.  Built from 1908-1912, it was declared, on November 6, 1993, as a National Historical Landmark by the National Historical Institute (NHI).
The expensive doll collection
The sala
A 4-poster, “An Tay” bed
The Steinway piano
Solo and Jandy browsing through books
on the round, single slab table
An old phonograph

We were toured around the house by a male guide.  The house was built with durable balayong, a hardwood coming all the way from Mindoro.  At the ground floor are photographs of Silay’s ancestral houses, a display to the Jalandoni’s expensive doll collection, 2 carriages, a gallinera (its bottom was used as a temporary enclosure for chickens) and a carroza with the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary which is still being paraded around the city during Holy Week.

A Stradivarius violin
A grandfather clock
A wooden harp

The second floor has embossed, prefabricated steel trayed ceilings imported from Hamburg, Germany.  Intricately carved, French-designed wooden calado transoms, a study of visual aesthetics and function, allow air to circulate within the house.  On display are antique furniture (including a single slab round table and 4-poster, Chinese-made “An Tay” beds), a wooden harp, Ming Dynasty chinaware, an old telephone, sewing machine, a Stradivarius violin, a grandfather clock, an old phonograph, a Steinway piano, chandeliers, etc.  The museum also features a fine collection of books, glassware and lace supplied by the Silay Heritage Foundation members.

Grace and Cheska at the grand stairway
Bernardino-Ysabel Jalandoni Museum: cor. Rizal and Severino Sts., Silay City, Negros Occidental.  Open Tuesdays to Sundays, 9 AM-5 PM.  Admission: PhP50.  Tel: (034) 495-5093.

Balay Negrense (Silay City, Negros Occidental)

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After lunch at Locsin Reunion venue, Solo again toured us around the city, this visiting the 12-bedroom Balay Negrense (Hiligaynon for “Negrense House”), one of the largest if not the largest ancestral house in the city.  The first museum to be established in Negros Occidental, it was built in the Neo-Renaissance style, from 1898-1912, by Yves Gaston.  Yves was the son of 19th century sugar baron Yves Leopold Germain Gaston of Lisieux (Normandy, France) and Prudencia Fernandez, a Batanguena.  Yves generated wide-scale interest in commercial-scale sugar cultivation with his horno econonmico, the precursor of today’s sugar mills.  

 
Balay Negrense

Victor Gaston and his 12 children lived here from 1901 until Victor’s death in 1927. During World War II, the house was said to have been occupied by Japanese military officers. Later, the house became a venue for a ballet school run by one of the descendants until the early 1970s but was abandoned shortly thereafter and fell into disrepair.

The grand W-shaped staircase

The Negros Cultural Foundation, a group of concerned Negrenses, managed to acquire, through a donation, the house from the heirs of Gaston. The structure was then repaired and furnished with period furniture and fixtures through donations from prominent individuals and, later, the Department of Tourism.  This lifestyle museum was officially inaugurated on October 6, 1990.  

The spacious living area
The round table with names of Gaston descendants

Now a showcase of Negrense art and culture, it displays antique furniture, a grand piano, Filipiniana costumes and Gaston memorabilia.  The museum boasts of a grand W-shaped stairway (women used the right stairway, men the left), calado or carved panels that served as ventilators between rooms, etched window glass, fancy-grilled ventanillas (smaller windows beneath the large windows with sliding panels that can be opened to admit the wind) and sprawling gardens.  Solo showed us a big round table with lists of the names of the owner’s descendants, some of them familiar names of celebrities and politicians.  Some of them were my relatives.

The grand piano
The 2-storey house has a lower storey of concrete, with foundation posts made with trunks from the balayong tree, a local hardwood also used as floorboards for the house. The upper storey is made of wood while the roof uses galvanized iron.  The house has a 4-m. high ceiling and is elevated from the ground level by a 1 m. high crawlspace which enhanced air circulation, allowing the wooden foundations to be aerated, preventing dampness from rotting the wood and preserving the integrity of the house.
 
L-R: Jandy, Grace, Solo and Cheska
 
Balay Negrense: Cinco de Noviembre St., Brgy. III, Silay City, 6116 Negros Occidental.  Open Tuesdays to Sundays, 9 AM-5 PM. Tel: (034) 714-7676 and 495-4916.

Ramon Hofilena: The "Father of Heritage Conservation" in Silay City (Negros Occidental)

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Manuel Severino Hofilena Heritage House

Certainly one of the highlights of our three-day visit to Silay City (Nregros Occidental), with my wife Grace and children Jandy and Cheska, was, aside from attending the 8th Locsin Family Reunion (my first), our tour of some of Silay’s 31 ancestral homes, accompanied by my young Silayanon cousin  Neil Solomon “Solo” Locsin.  Our longest visit was at the Manuel Severino Hofilena Heritage House, an illustrado’s house built in 1934.  A visit here was by appointment with current owner Ramon “Monching” Hofilena but Solo set it up for us with call to him. On hand to greet us was the 72-year old Ramon Hofilena himself.  

Ramon Hofilena

Since 1962, Monching has been welcoming visitors to his family’s ancestral house, the first Heritage House in Silay to be opened to visitors.  Also, since his return from New York in the 1970s, Monching has also been on a life-long crusade  to restore and protect Negrense cultural heritage.  He organized the Annual Cultural Tour of Negros Occidental (ACTNO), the longest running (nearly 40 years) cultural tour in the world.  Its itinerary includes Bacolod  City, Silay City (Jalandoni and Hofileña heritage homes), Victorias City (Church of St Joseph the Worker); Manapla (Chapel of the Carwheels) and Talisay City (PhP600/person, limited to 55 people).  The tour is often conducted yearly on all Saturdays of December, except holidays, from 9 AM to 5:30 PM.

The living room

The interiors of the house to be  exudes touches of genteel elegance.  The formal living room still has its original 1930s Art Deco period furniture.  Beside it is a 150-200 year old, German-made M.F. Rachals upright piano handed down by Monching’s great grandmother. Monching, a lover of art and culture, gave us a two-hour guided tour of his collection of museum-worthy pieces such as  antique lamps and chandeliers, large Ming dynasty jars, copies of the world’s first pocket books, silver picture frames (with pictures of his parents and 8 siblings; all of whom were involved in the arts: piano teachers, ballet and flamenco dancers, theater artists), a dining table set with fine china, silverware, wooden images of St. Vincent Ferrer, saved from the island’s old churches), wine glasses and silver candelabras, none of them reproductions.

The dining room


The comedor (dining room) has hardwood and glass cabinets (plateras ) that display Pre-Hispanic Chinese porcelain and ceramics, all of them archeological finds discovered in Silay (some an incredible 3,000 years old).  Monching also has a  collection of small dolls (said to be the smallest in the world, you need a magnifying glass to appreciate them) and curios from around the world, including tektites (meteorite stones) and anting-antings (good luck amulets).  The house also has an old press from Silay Printmaking (founded in 1970), the oldest printmaking workshop outside Manila.  Monching is working to popularize printmaking as an art form.  

Monching shows us his painting collection

Upstairs, lining the walls, are Monching’s  impressive collection (the most comprehensive personal collection on public display) of more than 1,000 works by foreign artists Francisco Goya, Pablo Picasso, Albrecht Durer, Katsushika Hokusai and Utagawa Hiroshige; National Hero Dr. Jose Rizal (when he was 15 year old student at Ateneo) and works of local artists from the 19th century to the present – Juan Luna, Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo, Ang Kiukok, Fernando Amorsolo, H.R. Ocampo, Jose T. Joya, Cesar Legaspi, Napoleon Abueva, Vicente Manansala and Bencab (Benedicto Cabrera).  Monching, with much emotion, gives special mention to abstract expressionist paintings of Conrado Judith, a poor and unknown Silaynon high-school graduate with no formal art education who died from tuberculosis at the age of 34. His canvas paintings, some damaged by sun and rain, were discovered by Monching in his thatch house.

L-R: Ramon Hofilena, Solo Locsin, Grace, Jandy, me and Cheska
Manuel Severino Hofilena Heritage House: Cinco de Noviembre St., Silay City, Negros Occidental.  Visits are by appointment.  Tel: (034) 495-4561.