THROUGH THE PAST
Huning Highlands tour explores homes, gardens in historic neighborhood
Several homes and gardens of the Huning Highlands neighborhood will be on display this Mother’s Day. The 2017 Huning Highlands’ Mother’s Day Tour features six houses and two gardens along a stretch of Walter SE. Eventgoers start the tour at Preservation Station, where they can pick up tour maps and a brochure.
“Each one is completely different and delightful,” neighborhood historian and co-organizer Ann Carson said. “... (Eventgoers) wander through the houses at any sequence that they want, and they have people there who will tell them about the history and guide them through the house. It’s a walking tour. It’s not too far in between houses.”
A house that has been redone or “brought back from the dead” is a likely candidate to be asked to be part of the Huning Highlands’ Mother’s Day Tour, which takes place every other year, Carson said. Home styles featured on this year’s tour include Queen Anne Victorian cottages, a Tudor Revival house and a bungalow.
“We have a brand-new house that is kind of a surprise, because we are not used to contemporary buildings, and this one was designed by the owners,” Carson said. “There’s going to be a variety of homes. Another aspect of this is we all kind of love old homes, and bringing them back to life is kind of an individual creative process. Some of us like to bring them back a little more contemporary, and some of us like to bring them back with a real flair of the old. I think people are going to see a mix of that in addition to this one who is putting in a contemporary home in the midst of the houses that were built around 1900 and what that’s like and how you make them work well together. It’s going to be a nice eclectic blend.”
Huning Highlands was “run down” during the 1960s and 1970s. The neighborhood saw a revitalization after it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978, which allowed homeowners to receive income tax rebates on work they did on their houses. An exhibit on the neighborhood, originally known as Franz Huning’s Highland Addition, will be featured during an exhibit at the Albuquerque Museum beginning in November, according to Carson.
“I think when people drive into Downtown you come down Lead and you will see this neighborhood that’s, like, what?” said Salley Trefethen, Huning’s Highland Neighborhood Association board member. “It’s this anomaly that’s sitting here. There’s something about, how did it get here? … These houses don’t fit with the rest of the city.”