In the time it took to wend through the Winchester Mystery House on a self-guided tour July 13, the 160-room mansion was closed to visitors again after the state reversed its decision to ease COVID-19 restrictions in some counties and Santa Clara County followed suit.
While affected businesses had until July 15 to close up shop again, the venerable San Jose tourist attraction closed its doors after just a day of allowing masked guests in socially distanced groups to traipse through the house that Sarah Winchester built. The gardens on the four-acre estate were open for self-guided tours through July 18.
The aborted reopening came four months to the day that the Winchester Mystery House had initially shut down under the “shelter in place” order. During that time, a virtual tour of the mansion was developed while staff waited for word on when they could reopen.
“We’ve been working around the clock on embracing the new normal,” Winchester Mystery House General Manager Walter Magnuson said in a July 14 interview. “Yesterday was wonderful in that visitors greatly enjoyed it and did as they were asked from a safety perspective.”
Barring the guided tours visitors normally take, audio clips let them know what various rooms were used for and pointed out the house’s architectural anomalies. Some tour guides had been rehired to answer visitors’ questions.
“Where we could safely place mansion hosts, we wanted to make sure they were available to help,” Magnuson said.
While Magnuson said he respects decisions by Santa Clara County Public Health Director Sara Cody that are designed to curb new cases of the coronavirus, he expressed concern that the July 13 order was issued without an end date, particularly because of all the work that went into reopening the Winchester Mystery House.
“It’s an incredibly stressful time in terms of lack of control,” he said. “Initially, we were meeting or exceeding all the criteria for an indoor museum.
“We created this incredible experience, but we can’t allow people to see it.”
Plans are in the works to take advantage of the estate’s outdoor space following the initial run of garden tours.
“We’re putting together a nighttime garden tour,” Magnuson said. “It lets you get up close and personal with Sarah Winchester without going inside.”
Bottom line, he added, staff is looking for ways to allow the public to visit the historic estate during a historically unprecedented public health crisis.
“If we can offer something safe and entertaining, we’re going to.”
For more information, visit https://winchestermysteryhouse.com.