During lockdown I visited a lot of parks around the city as a way to get fresh air and to inject some semblance of “adventure” into my dull life. All photos by Alex Mak

Cayuga Playground, better known as Gayuga Park, is one of the strangest places I’ve been to in the city…and I’ve been almost everywhere.  It’s in the Outer Mission, and it’s a sculpture garden dedicated to the man who maintained and decorated the park for decades, Demetrio Braceros.

Known as Demi in the neighborhood, the Philipino-born artist was so dedicated to his craft and to maintaining the park’s gardens for 20+ years, that they made a documentary about him and built a permanent display case featuring his work and his story in the park’s rec center.

Demi’s wood carvings are placed all around Cayuga Park, with various little trailways, some with small, stone, road markers that say things like ‘Garden of Eden”.

There are dozens of sculptures throughout the park, with a ton of different themes, colors, and scales.

Some look like they are busy returning to the earth, they are made of wood after all.

Another odd detail is that the park is built literally underneath BART tracks so that every few minutes you see a train go hovering by.

There’s a wonderful gate built by famed Bay Area steel artist Eric Powell (check out his various public works around the Bay Area here.)  We can thank the San Francisco Arts Commission in part for making that happen, and for helping to renovate all the wooden sculptures too.

The gate is creative and welcoming, much like the park, there is definitely a bit of strange magic around this place. It’s the kind of walk that makes you think of the last time you ate mushrooms.

Just outside the entrance is a very San Franciscan mosaic stairway and mural dedicated to Cayuga.

Don’t forget that Cayuga park also features lots of traditional parky things that are newly built too, the park had a major renovation in 2013 thanks in part to Urban Greening Grant (UGG) Program voted on by CA voters (prop 84), and SF Public Works who provided the new designs and oversaw construction.

There is now:
Small Baseball Diamond
Community Room(s)
Outdoor Basketball Court
Playground
Restrooms
Tennis Courts

Cayuga Playground
301 Naglee Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94112
Website: sfrecpark.org