Rosicrucian Park

Rosicrucian Park is the working headquarters of the Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis, assembled from 1927 by H. Spencer Lewis on what had been orchard land in San Jose's Rose Garden neighborhood, now an entire city block of Egyptian and Moorish architecture. Its anchor is the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum, whose Karnak-inspired building opened in November 1966 under Lewis's son Ralph Maxwell and whose collection, begun in 1928 and enlarged after H. Spencer Lewis's 1929 tour of Egypt, is described by the museum itself as the largest display of ancient Egyptian artifacts in Western North America. Around it sit the order's own ritual landscape: the planetarium AMORC counts as the fifth built in the United States, a Research Library of esoteric materials, an Eighteenth-Dynasty-style Peace Garden dedicated to peace and tolerance, and a Chartres-based labyrinth the order calls the first fully accessible labyrinth in the world.

The visit is unusually generous for an order's private headquarters: the gardens and labyrinth are open daily from 8 am to sunset at no charge, the museum runs Friday through Sunday at $15 for adults with walk-up tickets, and the library opens to the public on weekends. The order also practices in public view; its Council of Solace gathers weekdays to meditate on behalf of others, and members and the public both move through the grounds. The new Alchemy Museum is under construction here, planned by AMORC as the first alchemy museum in the United States with an approach that folds in what they describe as modern-day neuroscience; until it opens, an Alchemy Exhibit curated by Dennis Hauck occupies the museum, walking visitors through the seven stages of the alchemical process. This is a living esoteric organization presenting itself in its own architecture, and the entry says exactly that.

Visiting

Rosicrucian Park at 1660 Park Avenue, San Jose: Peace Garden and labyrinth open daily 8 am to sunset, free. The Egyptian Museum runs Friday 9-4, Saturday and Sunday 11-6; adults $15, seniors and students $12, children 7-17 $10, under 7 free; no cash; photography without flash permitted. The Research Library opens Saturday and Sunday 12 to 4. The Alchemy Museum is under construction, with an interim Alchemy Exhibit inside the museum; check the site for construction closures.

Photo: [CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rosicrucian_Egyptian_Museum_entrance.jpg)