Discover. Experience. Enjoy STA. BARBARA, ILOILO

Another museum is opening soon in Santa Barbara, Iloilo - the Ecclesiastical Museum of Santa Barbara. It will feature the ecclesiastical art collection of the parish of Santa Barbara.  It will be located at the convent of the church of Santa Barbara which has been declared a National Historical Landmark in 1991, and a National Cultural Treasure in 2013.  A budget of P4.85 million from the Government Appropriation Act of 2017 has been allocated for the project, according to the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP). The ecclesiastical museum will be the second museum of the municipality, which already has the Santa Barbara Centennial Museum that was built in 1998 as part of the Centennial Freedom Trail Site Project of the Philippine Centennial Commission. The centennial museum houses antiques, artifacts and photos that tell the story of Santa Barbara’s historical heritage. The ecclesiastical museum will have four galleries with a total a...

More shopping choices and job opportunities for the Santa Barbaranhons will come as SM Savemore opens its  Santa Barbara, Iloilo branch (tentatively) this September 2016. Conveniently located at a major crossroad known as Bangga Osting, it will have have two entry/exit points on both Roosevelt and Arroyo streets and a parking space for a few vehicles. Floor Plan photo c/o Elmer Franco It is said to be the first Savemore branch in the province outside of Iloilo City. Enjoy your shopping very soon!

On display until the weekend at the Victory Plaza is a diorama depicting the Via Crucis. Located at the bandstand, these miniature 14 Stations of The Cross opens in the afternoon for devotees and visitors experiencing Semana Santa in Santa Barbara.

Good Friday Procession With Santa Barbaranhons predominantly Roman Catholics, the whole town commemorates Semana Santa with rituals, traditions and gastronomy that has shaped this celebration for centuries now. One of the Kapiyas dotting the town's poblacion  Kapiya and Pasyon-singing century-old traditions observed by Santa Barbaranhons every Holy Week, wherein, the life story of Jesus Christ is foretold through singing with strings as accompaniment. This activity is participated by the different barangays in the town.  Singing the Pasyon Palm leaf Creation is another activity wherein old folks compete for the most intricately-designed palm-leaf. This is staged every Palm Sunday to celebrate Christ’s triumphal entry intro Jerusalem. He was welcomed with a crowd waving palm branches. All these activities are celebrated annually.  Domingo de Ramos procession PASYON The Pasyón is normally heard during Holy Week in the Philippines, where its recit...

 PALM SUNDAY commemorates the triumphant entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem. It commences the start of the Holy Week with rituals and traditions that include a procession of the assembled worshippers carrying palms, representing the palm branches the crowd scattered in front of "Jesus as he rode into Jerusalem". The origins of the Palm Sunday palaspas can be traced as far back as the pre-Hispanic Philippines. In his 1589 account, Fray Juan de Plasencia describes how early Filipinos would use “leaves of the white palm, wrought into many designs” to decorate lamps during festivities.  Here are some photos of the 2016 Domingo de Ramos celebration coming from the Santa Barbara Ugyon Facebook Page .

The giant Philippine flag in the municipal plaza of Santa Barbara, Iloilo where Philippine independence in the Visayas was proclaimed in 1898, will now be permanently hoisted as declared by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP). Santa Barbara plaza in Iloilo now joins a short list of places in the country where the national color is permanently hoisted 24/7 and illuminated during the night, according to NCHP Executive Director Ludovico Badoy. Badoy, Gov. Arthur Defensor, Santa Barbara Mayor Dennis Superficial and Army Col. Eric Ochida unveiled this morning a marker at the base of the flag during the occasion of the 117th anniversary of the first raising of the Philippine flag in the Visayas and Mindanao. The marker reads, " As mandated by Republic Act 8491, the Flag and Heraldic Code of the Philippines, the Philippine flag shall be permanently hoisted on this site 24/7 throughout the year and shall be illuminated at night. " Badoy said ...

On its third year, the National Competitive Council revealed the results of its annual Cities and Municipalities Competitive Index recognizing the most competitive cities, municipalities and provinces across the Philippines. It is an annual ranking of Philippine cities and municipalities developed by the National Competitiveness Council through the Regional Competitiveness Committees (RCCs) with the assistance of the United States Agency for International Development. Cities and municipalities are ranked on their competitiveness based on an overall competitiveness score. The overall competitiveness score is the sum of scores on three main pillars which pool data from several sub-indicators. The three main pillars are: economic dynamism, government efficiency and infrastructure . Scores are determined by the values of the actual data, as well as the completeness of the submitted data. The higher the score of a city or municipality, the more competitive it is. For the fi...