"Kare" for some Art?: The Alley at Karrivin Plaza

- March 18, 2022, Friday; March 24, 2022, Thursday.

- This blog will be a little bit different from the usual, since I'm merging two visits to Karrivin Plaza in one blog. The two visits were a week apart. I thought of merging them since I wanted to mostly enumerate the interesting things to see and experience at Karrivin Plaza, rather than my usual by-sequence narrative (i.e. "I did this, next I did this, then I did this etc.") 

- Karrivin Plaza has been around for many years now, and is mostly known as an art-and-food hub. It is located near the Magallanes area in Makati City. Karrivin Plaza has three main buildings: A, B, and C. The latest attraction is The Alley (Building C), which opened in 2016. This surprised me as I haven't heard anything about this place until late last year, in the middle of the pandemic. Also, I don't normally frequent Makati.

- From an old warehouse, this place was turned into a quiet artsy corner of Makati where one can eat fusion cuisines, enjoy a gallery or two, or buy pieces of good-looking furniture. By the way, most stores are open from Tuesdays to Sundays.

Building C.

The Alley at Karrivin.

- The Alley has two main art galleries: The Drawing Room, and Artinformal. These contemporary art galleries showcase many Filipino artists' works. The galleries are free, but they might need to limit people due to the pandemic. If you know me well you'd know that I'm not really into contemporary art, but it was nice to appreciate various expressions of art.  

The Drawing Room, with acrylic paintings by Maria Cruz, Manuel Ocampo, and Gerardo Tan. They're collectively called "Terms and Conditions."

Near the entrance is a collection of paintings called "It Wasn't Just a Bad Dream" by Jigger Cruz.

This is at the second-floor of Artinformal. This painting is part of Pope Bacay's "Lures from the other Land."

More pieces from Bacay's "Lures from the Other Land." I love the organic, earthy vibes of these artworks!

Some paintings by Carlo Ricafort in Artinformal, in the exhibit called "Helter-in-shell." 

- Speaking of art galleries, you can go across to building B to visit Art Cube Gallery. It was a huge gallery, and found it the "homiest" of the three galleries I visited. 

"Imperfect Circles" exhibit.

I saw this fire escape in the middle of the gallery, I thought it was an art installation. Turned out it was a real fire escape. Still took a photo with it though.

Appreciating art.

The exhibit is called "Duality" by Dondon Jeresano and Arnica Acantilado.

- Other interesting places to see are some of its artsy stores, like Aphro and Lanai. Aphro invites a lot of visitors because of its towering pyramid-like display area and its adult-sized slide at the side! The items on display are on sale. 

Many cats call The Alley their home.

Black Panther!

Inside Aphro.

The cat is named Blanca! (Because she's white.) She likes to strut along The Alley. She's probably the most famous cat in The Alley.

Hi Blanca!

Of course I had to go down the slide!

By Blanca!! By the way, I was told that Blanca has learned to NOT destroy the artworks.

Going out of Lanai! It has a lot of nice-looking "Asian" stuff.

- Finally, the biggest crowd-puller is the food! All three buildings have some restaurants, but I only got to try Poison and Three Squares. Poison has Japanese food, but its donuts are based on Filipino flavors. I tried the Kikkoman-flavored donut and I think it was a bit weird, but the Kikkoman and cream combination seemed to work (??). As for Three Squares Cafe + Bar, it is located at the second floor of The Design Story furniture shop. (I know I should try Toyo too, but I wasn't able to!)

Outside Toyo.

Ramen and donut at Poison.

An interesting restaurant.

My French toast and chocolate cake at Three Squares!

A cozy cafe in the middle of the store.

- The Alley at Karrivin isn't a place that I'd normally go to, but it was nice to see what everyone was fussing about this colorful cozy corner in Makati. I do think, however, that it's a nice place to hang out and talk with friends that's not a mall / in the mall. I'm not sure how frequently I'll be visiting this place because it's quite far and traffic is building up on the roads again. However, I do hope that I'll get to try all the other restaurants in the area, since I feel that I'll be going back more for the food than the art. I'm happy that there are pockets of peace like this in the Metro!