2015 Sketchwalk at Sarrat, Ilocos Norte

Santa Monica Parish Church

Sarrat, Ilocos Norte 

Before 2015 ends I have decided to organize a simple sketchwalk with my art colleagues.  This time I decided to choose Santa Monica Church of  Sarrat, Ilocos Norte as our venue.

Santa Monica Church is the biggest in Ilocos Norte and possibly in the whole Ilocos region. The church is made from red bricks built in Earthquake Baroque and Neoclassical architecture. The church tower has a big clock that strikes every half hour. Around the church are brick fourteen Stations of the Cross. The convent, also known as Casa del Palacio Real, was rebuilt after two fires in March 1816 and October 1892. It served as the Presidencia Municipal or present-day town hall. It also housed Colegio de Santa Monica, an affiliate of Lyceo de Manila. The ground floor of the convent was converted as the parish museum and photo gallery in 1994.

The church was the venue of the grand wedding of Irene Marcos, daughter of President Ferdinand Marcos, and Gregorio Araneta on June 1983. A longer and wider choir loft was added for the wedding. The church garden was renovated to serve as the venue for the reception.

The church appears in the 2015 period biopic Heneral Luna as the stand-in for the parish church of Arayat, Pampanga.

Source: FYI

MARCOS MUSEUM
Sarrat, Ilocos Norte

Few meters away from the church, headed to see the birthplace of the late president Ferdinand E. Marcos, The Marcos Musuem located at Sarrat, Ilocos Norte. 

The Marcos Museum, in Sarrat, the birthplace of the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos, overlooks the Padsan River.  It 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.  Marcos  lived here until he was 8 years old when his family moved to Batac.  

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.   

Source: FYI