Fundación Casa Wabi — Local services in Oaxaca

This tour left me feeling very conflicted.

First, the price is incredibly high (600 pesos, $30 USD). This may not seem expensive to many tourists - but for comparison, entry to CDMX's Museum of Modern Art is 25 pesos ($1.50) and Museo Nacional de Anthropologia is 70 pesos ($3.50); both take a full day to tour, and have free public entry on Sundays. Casa Wabi's fee is inaccessible to locals, and they do not offer free days or discounted fare. This definitely sets a tone indicative of their relationship with their local community. They were also very displeased to take payment by card (which was surprising, as they're obviously catering to a particular type of tourist).

Second, the tour lasted about 1.5 hours, which mostly involved walking very quickly across the extensive grounds. Both the building and property are beautiful, but besides the permanent installations of Bosco Sodi (the property's founding artist) the work of others was not prominent - or at least not appropriately attributed (with the exception of one featured installation, by artist Claudia Compte *see pics - it's gorgeous).

Our tour guide seemed very knowledgeable of the property, but more interested in getting the tour over with than providing any sort of engaging experience. He did answer questions, if asked directly - but otherwise rattled off the basics of information and then set off for the next spot. We spent less than five minutes in the room with a group exhibition, which was not enough time to even snap photos of work for later review. It may have just been a bad day, but for the price, this was a real disappointment.

The property is incredible, though you will only be taken to see a small portion of it. The residential and studio spaces are off-limits, which is a shame (but understandable). That said, what you can see of the architecture is gorgeous. The design is quite flawless, as far as creating a stable and lasting structure, with functional passive cooling and incredible airflow. The concrete structure is comfortable, beautiful, spacious, and well centered in its environment - you feel the connection to nature. The natural landscape is beautiful, and relatively undisturbed by the facility. I do find it curious that architect Tadao Ando has never visited the finished site (per our guide).

They position themselves as supporting the local arts community, however besides teaching workshops for children, I did not see much evidence of this (and those I chatted with in the local community had very mixed responses). On closer examination, their residency programs are offered by invitation only (one cannot apply); and the invitation process appears quite exclusive.

As a lover of art and architecture, this property was worth a visit, and I appreciate the extensive labor and aesthetic care apparent. But overall, this felt far more like a rich artist's vanity project than an arts organization focused on giving back to its local community. Take that for what you will, but it made me deeply...

We (two people) had an accidentally great experience, until we met the staff. We arrived by car and saw what looked like a main entrance, closed with a cord and there was a dog standing there, no people, which completely looked like a "this isn't the main entrance" kind of situation. We parked the car: from the parking lot there is absolutely no indication on where to go, who to talk to, I mean absolutely not a thing, which I personally found interesting and was pondering if it was intentional to have the visitors experience and discover the space by themselves. So we walked around freely and the space is absolutely exceptional, one of my favourite looking places in general, if you're into this kind of architectural art. I felt like I was inside a dream-like environment with its own logic, again: loved it. We basically toured the entire place without encountering a single soul, we even arrived at the shop and wanted to buy the books but there was nobody. At some point we even accidentally wondered in what looked like somebody's private room and obviously we left promptly. We then walked up some stairs to find finally some people just staring at us from their computers. As we walked back downstairs we were told that we can't just walk around and we have to book a tour, and one was going to start in 40 minutes. The overall attitude of the staff during the communication was far from great. While in the waiting room we looked at a map of the place and realized we already saw everything, and since we didn't care for the way we were spoken to, we just left. On our way out we finally realized that the corded door with the dog was in fact the main entrance and there was a tiny sign pointing at the waiting area. Mind you that to read this you have to willingly walk towards a corded door with a dog! I don't have a problem with dogs but it really looks like a "no trespassing" situation. We loved the place, but a suggestion from a non-artist to the people who made visual communication their trade: put up a sign, we can't read minds! Also someone who can talk to people without coming across as a presumptuous jackass would we a...

If I could give it NO STARS I would, but Google won't let me. I was staying at Hotel Escondido next door and made my reservation through them at 10am. We got there right at 10am and as we were walking in a cleaning lady told us to go to the left, where the tours start. We walked to this open room that had NO signage or sign of anything, to the right side there is an open door to a hallway which one side leads to the lobby. There were three people sitting on a table, as we approach to ask a question, one of them stood up and told us we could not be there, and we needed to get out as he walked upstairs to get someone.

We walked out the way we came in and as we got to the non-descriptive open room a man in his 40s and rudely told us we could not be there. I replied by saying I had an appointment and now one had told us anything except go to the left. He repeated I could no enter as I replied no one told us. He then interrupted me, repeated the statement that I could not enter, and then told me, now you were told as he left. About 5 mins later another couple arrived for the tour.

About 5 minutes later, closer to 10:15 a man appeared, introduced himself as our guide and set some water out for all and signage, that is 10 minutes later than the tour is scheduled. After that, we were charged our “donation” which was 500 pesos, only to find out it’s voluntary and really $150 pesos. The tour is anything but mediocre. You only get to see less than half the house and then the rest of the locations to see are in the gardens which because of the weather, heat, and humidity, it makes it almost impossible to enjoy. And to be honest, not that impressive. In the end, in my opinion, DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME OR MONEY it is NOT...