A puzzling adventure in Tagaytay

Constructing puzzles relaxed her,” says Gino Lacuna about his mother, Gina’s, 28 years of building puzzles before she passed away in 2014.

True enough, scientists have concluded that solving puzzles can help “remediate age-related cognitive decline.”

“She had a lot of fun and found it very satisfying to immerse herself in the complex world of puzzle construction,” adds Gino.

Her first was a 5,000-piece Mickey Mouse jigsaw puzzle that she built for Gino when he was only three years old.

Today, at 33, Gino continues to work on jigsaw puzzles but he really prefers wooden artifact puzzles.

“You can just imagine! Some puzzles have 10,000 pieces! I have to arrange them so I will have an easier time finding the pieces that fit. You need a very high level of concentration as you need to sort pieces of the same color, shape and size. Some are so small the pieces are difficult to handle,” says Gino of the larger puzzles.

“My mom had many useful insights which she imparted to me when building puzzles. First, you need to have a lot of patience and determination. She told me not to be too absorbed in completing one section. I should move on to the other parts and, preferably, start with the edges after separating the pieces by color. Those were logical pieces of advice,” Gino muses.

It had become a tradition in their family to build puzzles together on Sundays. It cultivated their imagination as they had to — literally — see the larger picture and remember different shapes and colors to ensure that they fit the correct pieces together. Surely, they had to think fast and think logically. And somehow, the more puzzles they completed, the more they wanted to work on even more difficult and challenging puzzles.

“Whenever my mom travels, she makes it a point to look for puzzles with photographs of the place,” notes Gino.

“From just a simple hobby, my mother eventually completed 1,800 jigsaw puzzles — that made her a Guinness Book of World Records holder for the most puzzles made,” Gino proudly states.

She completed all kinds of tray puzzles: artworks by great masters, nickelodeons, nature scenery, animals, famous photographs, world landmarks, movie actors and others. Eventually, the Lacunas purchased a Tagaytay property on which they built a resthouse. After the Guinness feat, the Puzzle Mansion was born. 

It is now home to more than 2,000 puzzles, well-framed and exhibited floor to ceiling, wall to wall, and many more on shelves and neatly stacked on the floor.

It also has a Puzzle Boutique where one can find puzzles galore from different museums and puzzle manufacturers to bring home and hopefully start a hobby that, indeed, can enhance mental speed and thought processes and develop efficient and innovative problem-solving skills, not only in completing jigsaw puzzles but also in business and other professions.

They have the three largest puzzles in the world.

“The third biggest puzzle is called ‘The Life’ by Royce McClore. It is made up of 24,000 pieces and it took seven months, or 1,720 hours, to make. We thought that was difficult. Then she singlehandedly built the second biggest puzzle called ‘Double Retrospect’ by Keith Haring with 32,256 pieces and it took her four months to finish. That’s about 900 hours! We finally built the biggest puzzle in the world called ‘Wildlife’ by Adrian Chesterman with 33,600 pieces as a tribute to my mom. It took our family one year and eight months to finish — that’s about 16,800 hours.”

Our very knowledgeable tour guide, Chris Iguiz, educated us about the many pieces of artwork in the Puzzle Mansion when we visited the place.

Lota Mojica, the general manager kindly showed us around the property, beautifully surrounded by a lush garden.

“‘Las Hilanderas’ is probably the hardest puzzle my mom created. She almost gave up. The puzzle has a lot of black space and it really took a lot of trial and error to get the pieces right. ‘Las Hilanderas’ or ‘The Spinners’ is a painting by Spanish painter Diego Velazquez dated around 1657. It depicts the story of Arachne who challenged the goddess Athena to a weaving competition. Upon winning the contest, she was turned into a spider by the jealous goddess,” Gino narrates. 

Scientists say that building puzzles “assists our brains in the production of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that helps improve motor skills, increase concentration power, optimize confidence and enhance recollection.”

Those reasons alone should encourage many to take up jigsaw puzzle building and trying out other forms of puzzles to maintain a healthier mind.

Gino’s mother clearly possessed those skills when she was alive. “She started selling hair clips in Divisoria. Eventually she got into children’s clothes. Then, she started producing maternity clothes. Today, we supply maternity clothes to malls. And that is the bread and butter of the family,” Gino narrates.

One can see how the mind operates and how something so simple can evolve into a complex business.

Visitors to the Puzzle Museum will find puzzles to build wooden artifacts, vases made of plastic with a container inside that holds water; a Rubik’s Cube that allows you to solve 16 different puzzles in one cube; plus luminous, lenticular, crystal ball, embossed, crystal blocks, in-can, 3D puzzles, 4D puzzles, 3D wooden puzzles, glow-in-the-dark and more.

The Puzzle Museum also houses replicas of famous artworks by Auguste Pierre Renoir, Hieronymus Bosch, Michaelangelo, Pablo Picasso, Sandro Botticelli, Claude Monet, Gaudi, Leonardo Da Vinci, Salvador Dali, Vincent van Gogh, Robert van der Weyden, Johannes Vermeer, Nicolas Poussin, Klimt, Edgar Degas, Edward Manet, Francisco Goya, Paul Cezanne, Berny Sebe, Haruyo Morita, Diego Rivera, Ghambaro, Tom duBois. There are puzzles of famous world landmarks like the Eiffel Tower, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, plus Hollywood actors and pop stars such as Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley, and many more.

The museum has had over 500,000 visitors since they opened.

“Many have taken up the hobby as they have returned to purchase the puzzles we have in the Puzzle Boutique,” Gino says. “They claim they can better manage stress and feel proud of what they are able to accomplish, thus developing more self-confidence. Ultimately, it’s the relaxation it brings and what better way to attain longevity than having peace of mind and personal satisfaction in this dizzying and puzzling world?”

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Email the author at nikkicoseteng2017@gmail.com or text her at +639974337154.