A Dot-Com City Comes Back After the Collapse - New York Times

elainej — Sun, 20 May 2007 01:14:44 -0000

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Next Stop | San Jose, Calif.

A Dot-Com City Comes Back After the Collapse

Peter DaSilva for The New York Times

The Fahrenheit Ultra Lounge downtown near San Jose State University.

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By JOSH SENS

Published: May 20, 2007

ACRONYMS applied to up-and-coming urban neighborhoods often hint at grungy hipness, suggesting the presence of cutting-edge art galleries and underground nightclubs, with the promise of lattes and live-work lofts to come.

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Peter DaSilva for The New York Times

Santana Row, an indoor-outdoor mall with high-end retail and residential space.

So it is with SoFA in San Jose. On a recent balmy evening, in the South First Street Area, throngs of moviegoers gathered at the California Theater, a renovated Art Deco building. Left for dead for decades, then brought back to life a few years ago with a computer mogul's millions, the theater is now the home of the local symphony and the opera. But on this March night, crowds had come for a screening of a small-budget Israeli feature, one of 450 entries in the Cinequest Film Festival, an annual event that draws independent movies from around the world.

A block away, salsa lessons kicked off at a corner dance club. Diners filled the booths of a retro-chic restaurant, where bow-tied waiters toted plates of veal piccata and eggplant Parmesan. It was happy hour at a nearby “ultra lounge,” whether or not patrons knew what was meant by “ultra.”

Inside the theater, the movie started: a young woman rode a scooter through a lifeless city. Shuttered storefronts. Silent streets. It wasn't long ago that you could have filmed the same scene in San Jose.

“After the dot-com bust, this city was a wasteland,” said Cherri Lakey, who runs Anno Domini, a SoFA art gallery, with her partner, Brian Eder. “But one of the upsides of a landscape like that is that you get to start from scratch.”

Even before the tech implosion of the early 2000s, which snuffed out start-ups and sent vacancy rates soaring around the city, San Jose rarely ranked high on travelers' lists. Outsiders knew it largely for what it wasn't. It wasn't San Francisco (though it wasn't much more than a 40-minute drive away). It wasn't on the water. It wasn't a place they could locate easily on a map.

When, in 1989, San Jose surpassed San Francisco in population, the news did little more than reinforce the view of skeptics, who saw the self-proclaimed capital of Silicon Valley as anything but a capital of culture. It was, in their eyes, merely big and bland, an expanse of subdivisions spreading from a hollowed-out downtown.

That perception lingers still. “Some people have called it an image problem,” said Tom McEnery, a former mayor. “But I never have. It's never been an image problem because we've always had a positive image of ourselves.”

During his tenure, from 1983 to 1991, Mr. McEnery spearheaded an active civic effort to instill San Jose with a vital downtown. Slow to take root (then partly uprooted by an economic downturn and a corruption scandal that swept a more recent mayor out of office), those efforts have started to bear fruit. San Jose today is shaking off its past and its reputation, emerging as a city with a core and also a rich culture that appeals to travelers with eclectic tastes.

For starters, there are the museums. The San Jose Museum of Art stars in a constellation that ranges in focus from quilts and textiles to Mexican-American history and art. The Tech Museum of Innovation, befitting its Silicon Valley surroundings, offers visitors a hodgepodge of virtual experience, including a chance to “arm wrestle” with museumgoers in New York.

In a city that nurtures its art institutions, an underground art scene has also taken shape. Vacant buildings, which still blemish many downtown blocks, have been transformed into temporary exhibit space for local painters and sculptors, attractive place-holders until permanent tenants arrive.

The best established of these spaces, an airy, engaging gallery called Kaleid, sits on South Fourth Street. Along with a collection of other downtown galleries, it stays open until 9 p.m. on First Fridays, a kind of roving art reception held on the first Friday of every month.

By the stratospheric standards of Silicon Valley, San Jose ranks as affordable. How long it will remain so is a reasonable question as high-end condominium towers sprout downtown. These projects, once completed, are sure to be a boon to restaurateurs like the celebrity chef Michael Mina, who operates Arcadia, an innovative steakhouse, on the ground floor of the Marriott Hotel. A short walk from the Marriott stands a local favorite, the perpetually packed Original Joe's, which serves a throwback meat-and-potatoes menu at (again, relatively) throwback prices. Filet mignon is $26.95.

Downtown is flanked by the campus of San Jose State University and a cluster of SoFA nightclubs cater to the college-age crowd. Those with youthful spirits (but less delicate eardrums) often gravitate toward the Fahrenheit Ultra Lounge. “Ultra” is something of a hyperbolic reference to the less-than-ultra-surprising mix of offerings: cocktails, live music, full dinner menu. But, hey, you can get pan-seared scallops while you sip your gin.

In 2005, San Jose christened a new city hall. The $374 million project, designed by Richard Meier, features a gleaming building of glass and steel, fronted by a 110-foot-highrotunda that calls to mind a planetarium George Jetson might attend. Historic photos of San Jose are on display inside. From the city hall plaza, another point of local pride stands in view: the Martin Luther King Jr. Library, run jointly by the city and the university. Downtown's jewel, however, sits a few blocks away in the SoFA district. A grand 1927 movie palace, the California Theater, closed in 1973 as flight to the suburbs sucked the life from downtown. It remained shuttered until 2004, when David Packard — as in Hewlett-Packard — put $75 million into its restoration. The lavish theater, with its Art Deco detailing and kaleidoscopic ceiling, is now the stage for Opera San Jose and the Symphony Silicon Valley. Less well known is the theater's counterpart in the performing arts, Le Petit Trianon, a rose-hued building patterned after the Versailles palace of the same name. An acoustic marvel, it stands across town on North Fifth Street and is the site of chamber music concerts.

Several years before the California Theater reopened and SoFA started showing a vital nighttime pulse, developers cut the ribbon on their own downtown, five minutes west of city hall by freeway. Santana Row, a large mall with high-end retail and residential space, was decried by critics as a kind of Stepford showpiece, a triumph of commerce over culture. Mr. Eder, co-owner of Anno Domini gallery, refers to it today as Satan's Row.

“When I travel to another city,” Mr. Eder said, “I'm not interested in seeing what their Gap looks like.”

In fact, there is no Gap at Santana Row. But there are a Borders and a Tommy Bahama. And upscale restaurants such as Amber India, where curries crack the $20 price range, helping to cover the cost of the rose petals that waiters sprinkle across the bar.

On a recent Friday evening, as film festival ticket-holders streamed toward a SoFA screening, Santana Row, too, had begun stirring, like a sister city in an alternate universe. Shoppers swarmed Starbucks and Urban Outfitters. In an outdoor courtyard, a suburban restyling of a European town square, a pianist played pop standards. A line formed at the front door of Pasta Pomodoro, an Italian restaurant chain.

A traveler, in other words, could understand the critics. But shuttling from one spot to another — from the artsy, acronym-worthy downtown districts to the spit-shined storefronts of Santana Row — it did not seem surprising that San Jose had managed to embrace such contrasts. In a city this big, each could succeed in its own way.

VISITOR INFORMATION

WHERE TO STAY

Hotel Montgomery , 211 South First Street, (408) 825-0530; www.hotelmontgomerysj.com. The only hotel in Silicon Valley with an outdoor boccie court, the Montgomery goes a long way to keep things young and fun, with a buzzing bar and restaurant just off the lobby. It is in the heart of downtown, a short walk from major museums. The hotel's 86 rooms start at $129.

Hotel Valencia , 355 Santana Row, (866) 842-0100; www.hotelvalenica.com. An upscale hotel in the heart of an upscale shopping plaza, the Valencia has plushly appointed rooms for demanding travelers and a rooftop wine bar, Cielo, for travelers who need less sleep. Ayoma, a spa on the hotel's fifth floor, specializes in Indian ayurveda treatments. The 212 rooms start at $199.

Hotel De Anza, 233 West Santa Clara Street, (800) 843-3700; www.hoteldeanza.com. A historic downtown hotel with stately architecture and comfortable guestrooms, the De Anza appeals largely to business travelers. Its 100 rooms start at $139.

WHERE TO EAT

Arcadia, 100 West San Carlos Street, (408) 278-4555; www.michaelmina.net. The chef Michael Mina takes playful turns at surf and turf at this tony, unpretentious restaurant on the ground floor of the Marriott Hotel. Dishes range from lobster pot pie (price varies) to a $16 Kobe burger to whole fried chicken ($26 a person) carved tableside and served for two.

Original Joe's, 301 South First Street, (408) 292-7030; www.originaljoes.com. Open since 1956, this restaurant, ancient by downtown dining standards, attracts a family crowd. Many are there for the retro atmosphere, but the reasonable prices and charcoal-grilled meats make the place appealing in other ways.

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