BAHA News

BAHA Preservation Awards call for entries

2012-01-20T12:19:00.000-08:00

Before

After

Now is the time to submit your nominations for the 2012 BAHA Preservation Awards. The deadline for submissions is 1 April. See the nominating instructions for submission requirements.

February 2012 Fireside Lectures

2012-01-07T12:53:00.000-08:00

Join us for a series of illustrated talks on three successive Thursdays in February 2012. All lectures will be presented at BAHA’s McCreary-Greer House, 2318 Durant Avenue, and will begin at 7:30 pm.

Seating is limited to 30, and advance ticket purchase is required. Admission $10 per lecture. Call (510) 841-2242 or e-mail baha@berkeleyheritage.com to reserve your seats. Mail check to BAHA, P.O. Box 1137, Berkeley, CA 94701, or pay via PayPal to expedite your order. See instructions for using PayPal (a handling charge will be added).

Western Hills cemetery (courtesy of Foster Goldstrom)

9 Feb. 2012   Sold Out
Maybeck & Morgan: An Enduring Association
Speaker: Daniella Thompson

The two titans of Bay Area architecture maintained a career-long friendship and collaborated on various projects—including several financed by the Hearst family—over a period that spanned 45 years.

Editor of the BAHA website and author of the article series East Bay: Then and Now, Daniella Thompson will review the history of Bernard Maybeck and Julia Morgan’s association and collaborations from the mid-1890s until 1940. The talk will be illustrated with rarely seen images.

Ruth House by Donald Olsen (photo: Dave Weinstein)

16 Feb. 2012   Sold Out
Berkeley: A Modern Mecca
Speaker: Dave Weinstein

Berkeley may be better known for brown-shingle bungalows than for flat-roofed, glass-walled, open-planned houses, but few cities anywhere boast an equal wealth of modern dwellings.

Dave Weinstein, author of Signature Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area, It Came from Berkeley: How Berkeley Changed the World, and the text for Berkeley Rocks, and senior writer for CA Modern magazine, will conduct an informal pictorial tour of the greatest modern residences in and around Berkeley.

We’ll see houses by Richard Neutra, Roger Lee, Henry Hill, and other masters, both well-known and little-known. We’ll see how many of these buildings pay homage to Bernard Maybeck, Julia Morgan, and other Bay Area innovators from an earlier generation. As a bonus, we’ll see some of the great, though often neglected and sometimes vilified, modern buildings on the Cal campus.

50 Poppy Lane, designed by Katharine Gibbs Underhill (courtesy of Ann K.U. Tussing)

23 Feb. 2012   Sold Out
Family Stories: Living the Arts and Crafts Life in Berkeley
Speaker: Ann K. Underhill Tussing

Ann K. Underhill Tussing was born and raised in Berkeley, living her childhood in a house designed by her mother, Katharine Gibbs Underhill, a graduate of the California College of Arts and Crafts. Ann’s Gibbs and Underhill grandparents settled in the Berkeley Hills in houses designed, wholly or in part, by Bernard Maybeck, a family friend. Architectural plans of Maybeck’s Underhill House #2, Rose Walk, and two of Katharine Gibbs Underhill’s houses will be shown, as well as some exterior and interior photos.

Ann’s childhood was full of beauty and creativity, the natural setting of her home on a hillside lot with its redwood groves, dance lessons at the Temple of Wings, neighborhood theatrics, parties with the C.S. Forester family, learning to swim at the Berkeley Women’s City Club. There will be photos shown of these and other important parts of her families’ lives. Now she lives “East of Eden” in Syracuse, NY, where she has given this illustrated talk several times to the Arts & Crafts Society of Central New York. She is delighted to give it here, where it all began.

2012 California Preservation Conference

2011-12-28T15:16:00.000-08:00

Old Roots, New Growth—Cultivating Communities

Thursday, 3 May – Sunday, 6 May 2012
Oakland Marriott City Center

More than 30 sessions, tours, and workshops on issues facing California’s historic, cultural, and natural resources—taught by over 100 expert speakers, plus continuing education units are available for AIA, ASLA, USGBC, MCLE, and AICP.

Exclusive Tours that highlight Oakland’s architecture, landscapes, history, culture, and more.

Special Events at some of Oakland’s most historic and architecturally significant venues—including CPF’s signature event, the Three-Minute Success Stories.

For complete information, see the CPF website.

BAHA’s Holiday Open House

2011-11-29T23:29:00.000-08:00

Photo: Susan Cerny

Thursday, 8 December 2011
4 pm–7 pm
McCreary-Greer House
2318 Durant Avenue, Berkeley

Join us for some holiday cheer at BAHA’s annual December Open House. Meet your fellow BAHA members, find out what’s new at McCreary-Greer House, and enjoy light refreshments. Our gift shop will be open for your holiday shopping.

Letter to the owners of the Sequoia Apartments

2011-11-22T13:01:00.000-08:00

Sequoia Apartments (photo: Steven Finacom)

BAHA sent a letter today to the owners of the Sequoia Apartments building, 2441 Haste Street, which suffered a five-alarm fire on the night of 18 November 2011. Read the letter here.

Color, by Karl Kardel

2011-10-24T15:37:00.001-07:00

How paint colors and materials were done from the 1950s to the ’70s: not so easy then. It got a lot better for a few decades, but now it is near impossible to do.

I am really touched by the effort to save the colors at the North Berkeley Branch Library. Maybe a short review of color history I experienced will be of interest.

Not long after I came to U.C. Berkeley in 1959, I ran out of money, paying the extreme $700 or $800 in out-of-state tuition. I returned to painting and repairing homes to pay for my education, just as I did in Michigan during my high-school years, following my return from India after my father’s early death.

I was enthralled with the “library” of wonderful homes here, particularly the Craftsman homes. I found that the local living environment—versus the one where I grew up in Denmark (my family home), India, and Michigan—had become dull, maybe because of the depression and the Bauhaus influence, along with the political collectivization fist of the 1930s that dulled out much of the free spirit of architecture. Everything was gray, pink, beige, or white. That was it. And we have forgotten that Northern California really was an early source for the spirit we are trying to restore: recycling, local elements, sense of place, sense of human hands in our environment. It is no wonder that I ended up doing colors and finishes with Alice Waters up through today. We were all looking for a grounding of spirit then. Berkeley has led the world back to its values.

Around 1960, going into the Berkeley Dutch Boy paint store, I was told by the manager, “Son, you are a painter. We sell paint, you make the colors.” Well, I had been painting in oils since I was nine, so this was not a problem. But for the rest of the painters, getting “whatevercameoutofthecan” was the best option (just like food back then).

How were colors done then? A limited number of standard colors were available. All other colors were done by “boxing,” or intermixing standard colors together from can to can. Or mixing pigments that came in lead tubes. God help you if you ran out—you could never match it. Standard colors were basically gray, pink, blue, brown, or white; maybe a yellow. That was it.

Fuller Paints, a local manufacturer, made some ready-made trim enamels in very nice colors. Better still, Martin-Senour made great paints in deep colors for New England and colonial styles. But these were a tiny part of the market. This is where I cut my “color teeth” for fancy Berkeley homes. The colonial colors had a definite mathematical relationship; it was subtle but tricky.

In the 1950s and ’60s, we had many, many local paint stores.
Going east to west:

Fuller Paints, a local manufacturer—great paints
Pittsburgh Paints store
Morwear Paint, a local manufacturer
Boysen, a local manufacturer—great colors in enamels
Dutch Boy, a local manufacturer
Sherwin Williams
The Color Shop—mostly auto paints, but local
Triangle Paints, a local manufacturer
Davlin Paint Company, a local manufacturer

North to south:

The Color Shop, a local manufacturer
East Bay Paints—local
Marks Paint—local
L&H Paint Products—a local manufacturer
Dunn-Edwards Paints, a local manufacturer
Karldon—local but garbage
Sinclair Paint Company, a local manufacturer of very high-quality paint. It was bought out and closed down.
College Hardware
Martin-Senour Paints, the only really deep color supply, in great variety
Cal Ink used to be located in Berkeley on Fourth Street near Gilman. They made tints for paints and the printing industry.

Essentially, none of them remain. We still have:

Stiles Paint Manufacturing, the last independent in the Bay Area
Kelly-Moore Paints, who bought out some of the large independents that were left.

In days gone by, I could drive down the road and identify the paint manufacturer on the houses I passed.

Dutch Boy, now only a label in big box stores and a separate raw material manufacturer (NL Industries, as in National Lead…) used to have a plant locally. They had some good deep-color products. I would buy their errors at a dollar a gallon, and would experiment mixing them in barrels to get the colors I wanted. That is how I could afford doing colors, and my clients got them at less than half retail. Sometimes colors were mixed with pure acrylic that I got in barrels from Los Angeles, or augmented with stone powder. That is how I did the colors at Spruce and Eunice—I made the paints.

Lawrence L. Lucas cottages (1928), Spruce St. at Eunice St.

Color jobs in the late 1960s were considered subversive and undermining the social order; they were accepted when it was found that real estate was worth more when people liked where they lived. The Victorian color revival came out of this. I had to buy a few buildings to get it going. America at the time had forgotten the need to love where we live, the sense of place.

For a short decade, we had many manufacturers with tinting machines and ready-mixed, very deep colors in “mill” mixes. “Mill” mixes were finely ground into the vehicle-very true colors, and durable. Tinting machines cannot make pure colors, and they fade fast. Such efforts used expensive pigments and soon became unsupportable. Today, high-quality pigments are not available on the retail market; you have to go to specialty manufacturers for powder, or else industrial or automotive coatings. These finishes can run over $125 a gallon. Pigments like royal maroon, Chinese green, and many others are just unheard of.

Working on houses by Maybeck, who was a magician with color, or Henry Hill (little known now) who, while modern, had a grand palette, we had to resurrect colors where the pigments originally used were no longer available off the shelf. Henry Hill loved color, and the tints I needed in order to reproduce his colors cost many times the actual paint.

So for a colorist, it is hard. For metals, you can get great colors in automotive paint. The paint stores are staffed by people who don’t know the fundamentals and can’t match colors. They rely on computer matching, which does a barely adequate job. The clerks don’t get their hands wet. All the cans and the colors within are tinted and do not allow experimentation. They can’t touch the actual pigments—all are sealed. Deep pigments are expensive, or no longer mined. So, in some respects, it is harder now than when I started, because when you’re young, you can be subversive with the raw materials at hand. Today, the materials are not very available. For very special projects, it is possible, but it’s like a museum restoration effort.

After all these years, I still dream of making a paint out of lapis powder. I once saw a 500-year-old church done with lapis, it was still luminous.

KARL KARDEL

Members’ reception at the Harris House

2011-10-08T23:02:00.001-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 2011

The Joseph W. Harris House at 2300 Le Conte Avenue is Berkeley’s premier Streamline Moderne residence. Designed by John B. Anthony in 1936, it was designated a City of Berkeley Landmark in 1976.

Harris was the flamboynant haberdasher of “Call Me Joe” fame. His Berkeley Square store was also designed by Anthony.

The Harris House is on the market for the first time in decades, and BAHA members had a private champagne reception and early viewing of it today. We’ve posted some more photos on BAHA’s Facebook page.

The Lueders House is Tom Roe’s masterpiece

2011-09-24T15:32:00.001-07:00

The Lueders House, 1330 Albina Avenue (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2006)

The biggest news in Berkeley real estate circles this week is the listing of the Lueders House at 1330 Albina Avenue. The house had been owned since 1972 by the late Thomas E. Roe (1943–2011), an artistically gifted contractor who devoted almost 40 years to restoring the 1889 Victorian.

I first wrote about the history of the Lueders House in 2006 for the Berkeley Daily Planet. My memoir of Tom Roe was published two days ago in Berkeley Patch.

Adding to our knowledge of this exceptional house, Tom Roe’s neighbor, Donna DeDiemar, documented the chronology of his restoration work in meticulous detail and published it in a Mixbook. It is an invaluable source of information and well worth reading.

In branch libraries settlement, losers outnumber winners

2011-09-11T17:15:00.000-07:00

West Berkeley Branch Library before the 1973–74 remodel that obscured its Beaux-Arts façade (courtesy of the Berkeley Public Library)

The recent Branch Libraries lawsuit settlement between plaintiff Concerned Library Users (CLU) and the City of Berkeley has sealed the fate of the South and West Berkeley branch libraries.

Few Berkeley residents, within or without the affected neighborhoods, have fought to preserve the library buildings, and few are mourning their imminent loss. And who can blame them? Both libraries, in their current state, are not beloved civic monuments that could galvanize a mass preservation movement.

Indifference aside, most Berkeleyans probably believe that a beautiful building is an asset to its neighborhood, and that a beautiful civic building is an asset to its city. Yet after decades of neglect, compounded by unsympathetic additions and “improvements,” both South and West Berkeley branch libraries are ugly in the eyes of most beholders. Nobody fights to save ugly buildings.

But most Berkeleyans were never made aware that behind the 1970s façade marring the West Berkeley Library lies the original handsome Beaux-Arts building of 1923, or that above the incompatible light fixtures in the South Berkeley Library’s reading room hides a magnificent ceiling.

The adult reading room in the South Berkeley Branch Library, mid-1960s (Donald P. Reay & Peter Paret: “John Hans Ostwald, Architect”)

The West Berkeley library was the first Berkeley building built as a branch library and the first library to be funded entirely by the city. Previous libraries had received donations from Andrew Carnegie, who gave away more than $40 million between 1886 and 1919, paying for 1,679 new library buildings across the United States.

The West Berkeley Branch Library emulated the elegant style of the Carnegie libraries. Its architect was Berkeley resident William K. Bartges (1894–1970), who was active here in the 1920s before moving to Sacramento, where he spent 30 years working for the State of California’s Department of Architecture. He retired in 1961 as Supervising Architect.

One of the West Berkeley Branch Library photos included here was taken in the early 1970s, shortly before the remodel that obscured the façade. At that time, the building was already 50 years old and in need of sprucing up, but its elegant lines were still apparent.

The 2004 renovation plan for the West Berkeley Branch Library (courtesy of the Berkeley Public Library)

In 2003, the West Berkeley Branch Library was designated a City of Berkeley Landmark, Structure of Merit. The following year, a renovation plan that would have restored it to its former appearance failed to receive a state grant.

New design for the West Berkeley Branch Library by Harley Ellis Devereaux (courtesy of the Berkeley Public Library)

As late as 2008, when the citizens of Berkeley voted to approve $26 million in library bonds for the renovation of the four branch libraries, the Branch Libraries Facilities Master Plan called for retaining the existing library building. Since then, the renovation was judged too expensive, and in 2010, a new boxy design by Harley Ellis Devereaux was unveiled.

South Berkeley Branch Library in the mid-1960s (Donald P. Reay & Peter Paret: “John Hans Ostwald, Architect”)

The South Berkeley Branch Library, designed by John Hans Ostwald in 1960, is one of Berkeley’s Mid-Century Modern gems (see additional information). Although not a designated landmark, it was identified as architecturally significant and underwent CEQA review (see the Initial Study). This building received the Berkeley Civic Arts Commission Community Award in 1965 and the American Institute of Architects/American Library Association Award of Merit in 1966.

New design for the South Berkeley Branch Library by Field Paoli (courtesy of the Berkeley Public Library)

This library, too, was deemed too costly to preserve, and is to be demolished and replaced with a new building designed by Field Paoli.

By the time CLU brought in architect Todd Jersey to design affordable alternative plans that would include the restored original buildings, it was too late. Nobody was willing to listen. Jersey was hounded into throwing in the towel with a public apology, which left CLU little choice but to settle.

West Berkeley Branch Library renovation design proposed by Todd Jersey Architecture

South Berkeley Branch Library renovation design proposed by Todd Jersey Architecture

While the residents of West and South Berkeley will receive functional new libraries, everyone in Berkeley will lose two fine examples of distinctive civic architecture. The new designs are not in the same caliber as their predecessors, and will not make up for their loss.

The lawsuit settlement calls for a $100,000 preservation fund, to be used for the physical restoration and preservation of other city buildings and some private structures.

One wonders what $100,000 can do for a single building, let alone a number of them. I would award the entire sum to the South Berkeley Community Church, a City of Berkeley Landmark located at the intersection of Fairview and Ellis streets. This very distinctive building, designed by Hugo Storch in 1912, is sorely in need of restoration, and the congregation has limited means.

South Berkeley Community Church (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Let the loss of two distinctive buildings be compensated for in part by saving a third.

Thousand Oaks urn dedication ceremony

2011-09-05T17:56:00.001-07:00

Saturday, 10 September, 3 to 5 pm
Great Stone Face Park

BAHA members are invited to celebrate the installation of two new urns, which are the latest street ornaments in the Thousand Oaks neighborhood.

A ceremonial dedication will be performed at Great Stone Face Park (Yosemite Road and San Fernando Ave.), followed by a party in the nearby garden of the historic Mark Daniels House, featuring a historical exhibit, music, and refreshments. There is no charge.

For those who wish to tour the area earlier that afternoon, Keith Skinner of the Berkeley Path Wanderers Association is planning a walk focusing on the urn sites and neighborhood history. The walk begins at 1 pm at Great Stone Face Park. See additional information here.

Thousand Oaks, the focus of BAHA house tours in 1997 and 2007, is a residential tract subdivided in 1909. Large monumental urns, in the style of Maxfield Parrish, were placed by the developers to mark streets and walking paths. This sort of civic art, like the pillars of Northbrae and Claremont, the Marin Circle fountain, and the gates of Claremont Court, was popular in the first decade of the last century and gave a distinct identity to each area.

Originally there were twenty or more urns around Thousand Oaks, but only one urn, at Indian Trail and The Alameda, remains today.

The installation of the new urns and the restoration of the existing urn is the culmination of eight years of effort by residents of the area. The project was awarded a 2009 UC Chancellor’s Community Partnership Fund grant that included professional support from UC landscape architect Jim Horner. BAHA is a Community Partner of this historic restoration project.

Trish Hawthorne, a veteran BAHA member, and Elizabeth Sklut, former president of the Thousand Oaks Neighborhood Association, are the project coordinators.

Fall 2011 Lecture Series

2011-07-29T16:35:00.000-07:00

First Church of Christ, Scientist (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2007)

Tickets: $15

Saturday, 24 September 2011
7:30 pm
First Church of Christ, Scientist
2619 Dwight Way, Berkeley

Mark A. Wilson :: Bernard Maybeck: Architect of Elegance
Mark A. Wilson, author of the new book Bernard Maybeck: Architect of Elegance (Gibbs Smith Publisher, 2011), will discuss Maybeck’s legacy and photographer Joel Puliatti will screen slides from the book. Maybeck’s granddaughter, Cherry Maybeck Nitler, will describe some of the most interesting anecdotes from her memories of growing up with “Ben.” A reception and book signing will follow. Co-sponsored by the Friends of First Church.

Thursday, 13 October 2011
7:30 pm
The Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley

Christopher Grampp :: From Yard to Garden: The Domestication of America’s Home Grounds
Christopher Grampp, author of From Yard to Garden: The Domestication of America’s Home Grounds, examines the history of the American home garden and tracks the evolution of front and back yards as the nation evolved from an agrarian to an industrial economy. He connects the emergence of the modern home garden to the rise of suburbanization, the growth of city services, and the post–World War II baby boom, which established the single-family home and its grounds as the ideal American dwelling. Grampp argues that the home garden is best understood as an expression of habitability, or the ways in which Americans have collectively and individually transformed their home grounds into functional outdoor living areas. A reception will follow.

First Unitarian Church (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Friday, 18 November 2011
7:30 pm
Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley
1 Lawson Road, Kensington

Daniella Thompson :: The Berkeley Unitarians and Architectural Innovation
Early Berkeley Unitarians, whose membership included the Maybecks, the Keelers, and fellow founders of the Hillside Club, held a progressive view of architecture. Their first church building at Bancroft Way and Dana Street, designed by A.C. Schweinfurth and completed in 1898, incorporates startling architectural features and has been characterized as a “powerhouse.” Daniella Thompson will trace the history of the Unitarian community in Berkeley, introduce its cast of leading characters, and discuss the links between culture and nature embodied in its church buildings. A reception will follow. Co-sponsored by the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley.

Directions to the church (please note: venue has changed)..

To order tickets, print, fill out, and mail the ticket order form.

You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify number of tickets and lecture date[s] in the Description line.

Alameda Legacy Home Tour

2011-07-24T20:23:00.001-07:00

Sunday, 25 September 2011
11 am– 5 pm
Advance tickets $30; day of tour $35

Open on this self-guided tour will be seven historic houses in central and east Alameda, including the oldest house in town. The tour benefits the Alameda Architectural Preservation Society (AAPS) and the Alameda Museum.

Advance tickets are available online. On the day of the tour, tickets will be available at Franklin Park (at the intersection of Morton Street and San Antonio Avenue). For more information, see the event’s website.

What’s Out There Weekend

2011-07-20T14:08:00.000-07:00

17 & 18 September 2011
Various locations
Free

The Cultural Landscape Foundation will host a series of guided tours of 25 Modernist designed landscapes in the Bay Area. Tour sites include the Kaiser Center Roof Garden (Ted Osmundson) in Oakland, Levi’s Plaza (Lawrence Halprin) in San Francisco, and Santa Clara Central Park (Robert Royston).

See the event page for additional information.

AIA East Bay Home Tours 2011

2011-07-13T16:53:00.001-07:00

13 August 2011
10 am–4:30 pm
Advance tickets $40; day of tour $50

The American Institute of Architects, East Bay, will hold its inaugural Home Tours of the East Bay this summer. Eight architect-designed houses a variety of architectural styles will be open in Berkeley, Oakland, Lafayette, and Orinda.

Sustainability, open floor plans, connection of indoors to outdoors, abundant light, and a mixture of modern and traditional materials are key features of the tour houses. Ranging in size from 768 sf to 8,500 sf, these houses demonstrate that excellence in design is not limited by size or budget.

The architect of each house will be on site to answer questions. The tour is self-guided.

Tickets may be purchased online; at the AIA office, 1405 Clay Street, in downtown Oakland (after 24 July); or on the day of the tour at either of these will-call stations: Table 24 restaurant, 2 Theatre Square, Orinda, or 2237 10th Street, Berkeley.

For additional information, see aiaeb.org.

2011 Preservation Awards Winners

2011-07-09T19:02:00.001-07:00

Bertin Properties (photo: Carrie Olson, 2011)

At its Annual Meeting on 26 May 2011, BAHA recognized eight restoration and rehabilitation projects for their part in preserving Berkeley’s architectural heritage.

Read about the winning projects and see their photos in our Awards Gallery.

Fall lecture series to be announced

2011-07-03T09:10:00.001-07:00

Our fall lectures series promises to be interesting. We’ll have talks on Maybeck, the evolution of domestic gardens, and the fascinating history of the First Unitarian Church of Berkeley. More details soon.

Two authors sign books

2011-07-01T13:28:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, 6 July 2011, 5:30 pm–7:00 pm
David Chu, author of Frozen Music, will give a presentation and sign copies of his book at the AIA SF, 130 Sutter St., Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94104.
$10 AIA SF members; $20 non-members.
Info: AIA calendar.

Wednesday, 13 July 2011, 5:30–7:30 pm
John King, author of Cityscapes, will give a presentation and sign copies of his book as part of AIA SF and WIlliam Stout Architectural Books’ Summer Book Club Lecture and Signing Series.
AIA SF, 130 Sutter St., Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94104.
$10 members; $20 non-members.
Info: AIA calendar.

Thursday, 21 July 2011, 6:00 pm
John King, author of Cityscapes, will give a presentation and sign copies of his book at the San Francisco Architectural Heritage Lecture Series.
Pier 1, The Embarcadero, Port of San Francisco.
$8 Heritage members & students (with ID); $12 general.
Info: sfheritage.org.

Thursday, 2 August 2011, 7:30 pm
John King, author of Cityscapes, will participate in a panel discussion with John Kriken on the subject of City planning in conjunction with resource management at the Mechanics’ Institute Library, 57 Post St., San Francisco, CA 94104.
Free for members; $12 general.
Info: milibrary.org/events.

Thursday, 2 August 2011, 7:30 pm
John King, author of Cityscapes, will sign copies of his book at Mrs. Dalloway’s, 2904 College Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705.
Free and open to the public.
Info: mrsdalloways.com.

Oakland Heritage Alliance summer walking tours

2011-06-18T06:05:00.000-07:00

9 July–28 August 2011
OHA members $10; general $15

These guided walks in various Oakland neighborhoods take place every Saturday and Sunday. To view the full schedule, visit OHA’s events calendar.

2011 House Tour Photo Gallery

2011-05-15T21:46:00.000-07:00

Annual Membership Meeting & Preservation Awards Presentation

2011-05-11T16:11:00.000-07:00

Downtown YMCA, one of the 2010 winners (photo: Carrie Olson, 2010)

Thursday, 26 May 2011
6:30 pm–9:00 pm
The Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street
Berkeley, CA 94709

To reserve, call (510) 841-2242 or e-mail baha@berkeleyheritage.com.

In-person House Tour ticket sales

2011-04-30T11:56:00.000-07:00

This week, House Tour tickets are available for in-person purchase (check and cash only) at the following locations:

BAHA, 2318 Durant Ave. (rear)
Tue, 2:00–5:00 pm
Wed, 2:00–5:00 pm
Fri, 2:00–6:00 pm
Sat, 2:00–5:00 pm

Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St.
Thur, at lecture, 7:00–9:00 pm

On Friday and Saturday, tickets buyers will be able to pick up their tour guidebook at the BAHA office.

Tour-day ticket booth will open at 12:00 pm near the eastern gate of the Spring Mansion, 1960 San Antonio Avenue. The street will be closed to vehicles.

House tour volunteers needed

2011-04-26T18:37:00.000-07:00

Moskowitz House (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2011)

We need some more volunteers for the House Tour on Sunday, 8 May. Volunteers work for two hours as house docents and have two hours free to tour the other houses. If you are interested, contact the BAHA office, baha@berkeleyheritage.com, ASAP.

Historic Branch Libraries could be saved

2011-03-25T16:29:00.000-07:00

by Gale Garcia

West Berkeley Branch Library renovation design proposed by Todd Jersey Architecture (click here to see the plans.)

Measure FF was approved by Berkeley voters in 2008, providing $26 million in bond funding to “renovate, expand, and make seismic and access improvements” at Berkeley’s four branch libraries.

While the letter and intent of Measure FF are being honored with respect to the Claremont and the North Branch Libraries, Berkeley’s Board of Library Trustees (BOLT) has decided to demolish the South and West Berkeley Libraries and replace them with brand new buildings.

A group called Concerned Library Users (CLU), who were concerned not only about the needless loss of historic resources but also about the injustice of using bond funding for a purpose that was in neither the language of Measure FF nor the campaign literature for the Measure, filed a suit against the City.

The first part of the lawsuit, about a hasty zoning amendment affecting libraries without review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), was settled rapidly. The City agreed about the need for review. The second part of the lawsuit about the misuse of Measure FF funding remains to be heard in Superior Court, at a date yet to be determined.

The South Berkeley Branch Library (John Hans Ostwald, 1960)

Todd Jersey’s proposed renovation design for the South Berkeley Branch Library

CLU hired Todd Jersey, the architect whose talent and ingenuity led to the preservation of the Richmond Plunge, to draw plans for both the South and West Branch Libraries. Everyone interested in the branch libraries should take a look at the plans to see the many advantages they offer.

For each library, Mr. Jersey’s design would preserve the historic portion and accommodate all the same programs as the BOLT plan—in a larger building than provided by the BOLT plan.

For the South Branch, this could be done at significantly lower cost—a larger library for less money. And the stunning reading room seen in the historic photo below could be restored.

Adult Reading Room, South Berkeley Branch Library

For the West Branch Library, Mr. Jersey’s plan would restore the 1923 reading room and Classical Revival façade, most of which remains intact under its blocky 1970s additions. For the children’s room, Mr. Jersey has designed a truly magical space, a circular room looking out at the redwood trees behind the library. Under his plan, the redwoods would be saved, while the BOLT plan calls for some of these trees to be destroyed.

First-floor plan for the West Berkeley Branch Library. The circular kids’ room is shown at the top.

The Todd Jersey plans for the South and West Branch Libraries are the environmentally superior preservation alternative—and they meet the mandate of Measure FF. Since CEQA allows for consideration of alternatives, these designs were submitted as part of the environmental review process. The City Council could choose these plans rather than the demolition-dependent plans, but sadly, preservation is not the focus of the current Council.

There will be a special joint meeting of the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) and the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) at 6:00 pm on Thursday, 14 April 2011. The LPC will consider the demolitions of the South and West Branch Libraries, and the ZAB will consider Use Permits for the demolition-dependent projects for the South and West Branch Libraries.

Letters to the LPC can be sent to the Landmarks Preservation Commission, c/o Jay Claiborne, Acting LPC Secretary, Land Use Planning Division, 2120 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704, or to JClaiborne@CityofBerkeley.info. Letters to ZAB can be sent to the Zoning Adjustments Board, c/o Steven Buckley, Secretary, Land Use Planning Division, 2120 Milvia Street, 2nd Floor, Berkeley, CA 94704, or to SBuckley@CityofBerkeley.info.

The City Council returns from spring recess on 26 April and will probably consider the alternative designs, the EIR, and the Use Permits at this meeting. Letters to the City Council can be sent to the City Clerk, 2180 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704, or to clerk@cityofberkeley.info.

In order for LPC, ZAB, or Councilmembers to receive letters before the meetings, they should arrive eight days ahead of the scheduled date. However, letters submitted up to and including the meeting time will become part of the record. You may also voice your opinion at each of these meetings. For more information, as it becomes available, please see this website or call the BAHA office. Your participation can make a difference.

Laurie Bright Memorial

2011-03-25T13:24:00.002-07:00

The family of Laurie Bright will be celebrating his life in memorial. Join Laurie’s relatives and friends in paying tribute to this exemplary preservation activist.

Sunday, 22 May 2011
1:30 pm–4:30 pm
The Hillside Club
286 Cedar Street
Berkeley, CA 94709

Pre-House Tour Lecture

2011-03-13T09:11:00.001-07:00

Stoodley House (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2011)

5 May 2011, 7:30 pm at the Hillside Club
Storybook Style
Speaker: Daniella Thompson
$15

Berkeley is a treasure trove of buildings that look as if they’d stepped out of a Mother Goose fairy tale. In the course of this illustrated talk, we’ll pay a visit to and marvel at the fanciful work of specialists in the whimsical genre that manifested itself during the 1920s.

Architects and builders who left their mark on Berkeley’s “Hansel & Gretel” architecture include William Raymond Yelland, Jack Thornburg, Francis Harvey Slocombe, Carr Jones, Sidney & Noble Newsom, and the Fox Brothers.

Editor of the BAHA website and author of the article series East Bay: Then and Now, Daniella Thompson will showcase both well-known and obscure examples of Storybook Style in Berkeley.

Tickets may be purchased via the ticket order form or online. See instructions for using PayPal (a handling charge will be added).

Our 2011 Spring House Tour

2011-03-12T09:09:00.001-08:00

Sunday, 8 May 2011, 1 pm– 5 pm

See our House Tour page for details.

Alternatives to Branch Libraries demolitions

2011-03-02T18:15:00.001-08:00

Todd Jersey Architecture

Todd Jersey is the architect responsible for the much publicized restoration of the Richmond Plunge. Now he offers innovative and practical designs for restoring and expanding the South Berkeley and West Berkeley Branch Libraries, which the Board of Library Trustees (BOLT) proposes to demolish.

Todd Jersey submitted his designs to the City of Berkeley in response to the Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for the Branch Libraries. BAHA has asked the City Council, BOLT, and key commissions to consider these designs carefully, since they offer many advantages. They:

meet or exceed the libraries’ programmatic & space requirements
are cost-effective and well within the budget
comply with Measure FF
preserve two important historic resources
provide much-needed civic street presence
meet green construction standards
comply with CEQA requirements

For additional information, read Judith Epstein’s article, “How a Public Process Led to New Designs for the South and West Branch Libraries.”

Outings on Fridays

2011-03-01T15:57:00.001-08:00

Our popular series of guided tours, organized by Sally Sachs, returns this spring and summer. The tours take place on the first Friday of the month. Lunch is optional and not included in tour price. Lunch reservation must be made at least 5 days prior to each tour.
$15 per tour or $40 for the series

Friday, 1 April 2011
11 am
John Muir National Historic Site
Martinez

Visit both the Italianate Strentzel-Muir home of the renowned naturalist John Muir and his family (Wolfe & Son, architects, 1882) and the Vicente Martinez Adobe (1849), set amid the family’s orchards. Congress created this hostoric site in 1964.
Bring a picnic lunch to eat on the grounds.

Friday, 3 June 2011
11 am
Fox Theater
Oakland

The fate of this grand movie palace (Maury Diggs and Weeks & Day, architects, 1927) was a cause for concern from the time it closed in1966 until its recent picture-perfect restoration. View the ornate interior reflecting an eclectic mix of historical styles and hear the success story of its preservation. Lunch in an uptown restaurant.

Friday, 8 July 2011
11:00 am
McCreary-Greer House
Berkeley

This elaborate 1901 Colonial Revival house serves as BAHA’s headquarters. A City of Berkeley Landmark, it is a remnant of an elegant turn-of-the-century Southside neighborhood. Learn how BAHA acquired this special house, tour its interior, and survey the historic block on which it stands. Lunch at a nearby restaurant.

To order tickets, print and fill out the ticket order form and mail it with made out to BAHA and a stamped, self-addressed envelope to:

BAHA
Outings on Fridays
P.O. Box 1137
Berkeley, CA 94701

You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify your outing date[s] and number of tickets in the Description line.

AIA East Bay Endangered Buildings List

2011-02-17T13:19:00.001-08:00

Submission deadline: 31 March 2011

Do you pass a neglected, old building on your way to work every day?
Do you see a historic garden becoming a barely-recognizable weed patch?

AIA East Bay just inaugurated its Endangered Historic Places Program and needs your help to compile a list of endangered historic places in Alameda, Contra Costa, Napa and Solano counties. The goal of compiling the endangered places list is to call attention to their history and plight, raising the awareness on a regional level.

On 25 May 2011, AIA East Bay will present the region’s endangered places, followed by a wine and cheese reception.This event will be held at 6 pm at the AIA East Bay, 1405 Clay Street in Oakland. Registration will open on 1 April 2011.

All submissions will be listed unless they are incomplete; this is not a juried listing.

For more information e-mail endangered@aiaeb.org or call (510) 464-3600.

Imaginarium: Drawings by Bernard Maybeck

2011-02-01T15:50:00.000-08:00

24 February–6 June 2011
Flora Lamson Hewlett Library
Graduate Theological Union
2400 Ridge Road
Berkeley, CA 94709

This exhibition features original drawings that Maybeck created for his colleague Julia Morgan’s Western Hills cemetery project in Lawndale (now Colma). Although the cemetery was never built, the drawings themselves stand as a monument to Maybeck’s imagination and artistry. Included are these works from the private collection of Foster Goldstrom, as well as documents, photographs, and books from the GTU archives and other Bay Area collections.

The exhibition is free of charge and open to the public during library hours. It formally opens at 6:00 pm on 24 February 2011, with a lecture by Daniella Thompson on Bernard Maybeck and Julia Morgan’s collaborations. A reception in the Dinner Board Room will follow. For further information, please call (510) 649-2500 or visit http://www.gtu.edu/library/news/art-exhibitions/.

Preservation Awards call for entries

2011-01-22T12:52:00.001-08:00

Berkeley YMCA (photo: Carrie Olson)

BAHA invites the nomination of outstanding projects that have renewed the life of historic properties and neighborhoods in the city of Berkeley. Entries will be judged according to such criteria as aesthetic quality, historic significance, and contribution to the fabric of the city.

The deadline for submitting nominations is 1 April 2011. See instructions in our Call for entries page.

Fireside Lectures sold out

2011-01-19T15:37:00.000-08:00

All three of our February Fireside Lectures are sold out.

The Storybook Style lecture is oversubscribed; if you reserved but did not send payment, we regret that we won’t be able to accommodate you this time.

If demand warrants, we may repeat these lectures in the future.

Thank you for your understanding.

February Fireside Lectures

2011-01-11T15:57:00.000-08:00

Join us for a series of illustrated talks on Thursdays in February 2011. All lectures will be presented at BAHA’s McCreary-Greer House, 2318 Durant Avenue, and will begin at 7:30 pm.

Attendance is limited to 30, and advance registration is required. Admission $5. Call (510) 841-2242 or e-mail baha@berkeleyheritage.com to register. Pay via PayPal to expedite your order. See instructions for using PayPal (a handling charge will be added).

Classic Boxes (photo: Susan Cerny)

10 Feb. 2011  Sold Out
Susan Cerny on Colonial Revival “Classic Boxes”

In central Berkeley, on or very near the earliest streetcar lines, the rows of simple, box-shaped, two-story houses with hipped roofs are so numerous that they are hardly noticed or considered. These houses are of a style known variously as Colonial Revival, Classic Box, Rectilinear, Four-Square, and Prairie. They are found throughout the country, in large cities as well as in small towns. In Berkeley they were built between 1895 and 1909.

Author of Berkeley Landmarks and An Architectural Guidebook to San Francisco and the Bay Area, Susan Cerny will discuss the origins of this vernacular style, including examples of its wide dissemination, its many variations, and the reason why many Classic Boxes are now threatened.

Webb Block (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2005)

17 Feb. 2011  Sold Out
Will King and Gail Lombardi on Charles W. McCall

Oakland architect Charles W. McCall (1878–1948) achieved recognition as the designer of Berkeley’s landmark Webb Block (1905) at Ashby Avenue and Adeline Street; the Livermore-McCall houses (1915) in the Russian Hill-Vallejo Street Crest Historic District, San Francisco; the Robert Dollar Building at 311 California Street, SF (1919); and the Wakefield Building (1924) at 426 17th Street, Oakland.

McCall was prolific and versatile. He designed over 250 residential, commercial, and public buildings, employing a variety of styles, including Colonial Revival, Mission Revival, Beaux Arts, Craftsman, Mediterranean, Prairie, and Art Deco. McCall applied a continuously evolving but unique personal approach to his work.

Authors of Designing for a Purpose: The Life and Works of Charles W. McCall, Will King and Gail Lombardi will share their research on McCall’s Berkeley legacy of at least 27 buildings (15 of which survive), including historic and contemporary images, newspaper accounts, and family photographs.

Thornburg Village (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

24 Feb. 2011  Sold Out
Daniella Thompson on Storybook Style

Berkeley is a treasure trove of buildings that look as if they’d stepped out of a Mother Goose fairy tale. In the course of this illustrated talk, we’ll pay a visit to and marvel at the fanciful work of specialists in the whimsical genre that manifested itself during the 1920s.

Architects and builders who left their mark on Berkeley’s “Hansel & Gretel” architecture include William Raymond Yelland, Jack Thornburg, Francis Harvey Slocombe, Carr Jones, Sidney & Noble Newsom, and the Fox Brothers.

Editor of the BAHA website and author of the article series East Bay: Then and Now, Daniella Thompson will showcase both well-known and obscure examples of Storybook Style in Berkeley.

Robert Judson Clark

2011-01-10T17:24:00.000-08:00

Robert Judson Clark at work on his Thorsen House
manuscript, Berkeley, 1982 (photo: Anthony Bruce)

With the death of architectural historian Robert Judson Clark on 4 January 2011, BAHA lost a friend and a mentor. Robert’s abiding love for Berkeley and its architectural heritage was an inspiration for all of us through the years.

Robert was an international authority on the Arts and Crafts Movement and considered the father of the Arts and Crafts revival. Our tribute to him is published here.

BAHA’s Holiday Open House

2010-11-17T21:11:00.001-08:00

Photo: Susan Cerny

Thursday, 9 December 2010
4 pm–7 pm
McCreary-Greer House
2318 Durant Avenue, Berkeley

Join us for some holiday cheer at our annual December Open House. Special guest Inge S. Horton, author of the just-released Early Women Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area: The Lives and Work of Fifty Professionals, 1890–1951, will be on hand to sign books and answer questions. Inge’s book is crammed with photographs and information on fifty lesser-known women architects. This is a must-have book for those interested in local architecture.

Refreshments will be served and, of course, BAHA’s own publications—including our bestselling 41 Berkeley Walking Tours—will be available for holiday shopping.

RSVP to baha@berkeleyheritage.com.

More developers finance the Yes on R campaign

2010-10-25T14:39:00.001-07:00

The second filing by the Yes on Measure R campaign of California Form 460, Monetary Contributions Received, reveals that between 1 and 16 October 2010, the campaign received $21,950, bringing the total contributed so far to $54,400.

It will come as no surprise to anyone that a good many of the contributors are the familiar developers whose names are perpetually linked with controversial land-use projects in Berkeley.

Tied in first place, having contributed $5,000 each, are Pacific Gas & Electric and the Northern California Carpenters Regional Council PAC. The carpenters recognize an opportunity for more jobs in the promise of accelerated development offered by Measure R. As for PG&E, $5,000 is peanuts compared to the $46.1 million the utility spent on vainly trying to pass the anti-green Proposition 16 in June.

In second place, with $2,000 each, are First Shattuck, LLC and Constitution Square, LLC. First Shattuck owns and manages the 13-story Great Western Building—known since 1997 as the Power Bar Building and soon to be known as the Chase Building—in the heart of downtown Berkeley. Between 2001 and 2009, First Shattuck earned $917,347 in Federal contracts through lease or rental of office facilities.

Constitution Square, LLC of San Rafael is just another name for Wareham Development, a major commercial developer and landlord in West Berkeley. The name comes from the Constitution Square Building at 2168 Shattuck Avenue, which Wareham developed in 1983 and sold in 2004 to Seagate Properties, also of San Rafael.

Seagate Properties, which gave $1,000, owns and manages five properties in central Berkeley, including the Wells Fargo Building, the aforementioned Constitution Square, 1950 and 2030-40 Addison Street, and the Promenade at 1936 University Avenue. Seagate was the initial developer of the 9-story Arpeggio at 2055 Center Street, which it sold in 2005 to SNK Realty Group of Phoenix, Arizona.

Four other contributors came into play with $1,000 each. Developer Patrick Kennedy sold his seven apartment buildings to Sam Zell’s Equity Residential, but he continues to develop properties in Berkeley and owns the landmark Ennor’s Restaurant Building (formerly the Act 1 and 2 cinemas) at 2130 Center Street.

Townsend 1, LLC of San Francisco is a private company categorized under Private Elementary and Secondary Schools. However, when this reporter phoned their office, the recorded greeting identified the business as Townsend Properties.

Doug Herst, who also contributed $1,000, is a lighting industry veteran. His family founded Peerless Lighting in 1892, and Herst managed the company from 1965 until his retirement in 2006. Upon his retirement, Herst turned his attention to property development in Berkeley. Currently he is chairman and CEO of Herst Ventures, Inc. and working with Darrell de Tienne on a planned work-live development called Peerless Greens. Like a number of other Yes on R contributors, Herst is a generous donor to the Berkeley Repertory Theatre—the Rep’s 2009 annual report places him in the Presidents category ($3,000–$5,999).

The cypher among the $1,000 contributors is Fair-Hill Enterprises, Inc. of Danville. This company is run by its president, James A. Hill, out of his home in the Diablo Highlands subdivision. It was incorporated in May 2009 and was preceded by Fair-Hill Enterprises, LLC, formed in January 1997 and converted out.

Five entities contributed $500 each. Rue-Ell Enterprises, Inc. is familiar to most Southside and Northside dwellers as the owner of rental properties, commercial arcades, and food courts. Hotel Shattuck is owned and operated by BPR Properties of Palo Alto. A few years ago, before the economic bubble burst, BPR proposed to build a 16- or 19-story tower in the hotel’s rear. Measure R would help make that dream a reality.

1950 MLK LLC is another name for Hudson McDonald, developers of the 148-unit New Californian apartment complex, popularly known as the Trader Joe’s Building. A fourth contributor who gave $500, Eat/Work Development, is a real-estate development limited partnership headed by Michael Goldin, an architect, furniture designer, and landlord to various commercial tenants in West Berkeley.

The fifth entity who gave $500 to Yes on R is Berkeley Foundation for the Arts, a non-profit associated with the ACCI Gallery at 1652 Shattuck Avenue. Interestingly, only this past June, councilmember Jesse Arreguín, a leader of the No on R campaign, relinquished $750 from his council office budget to be granted to Berkeley Foundation for the Arts to fund the design and execution of a large-scale mural on the south-facing wall of 1690 Shattuck Avenue.

Greenbelt Alliance contributed $250 to Yes on R, having apparently fallen for its “green” promise.

David Fleishhacker of San Francisco gave $100. A career educator and author, he is president of the Fleishhacker Foundation and a member of the Berkeley Rep board of trustees. The Rep’s 2009 annual report places him in the Associate Producer donor category ($6,000–$11,000).

Closing the current Yes on R contributors’ list with $75 is architect and sometime developer David Trachtenberg, whose practice seems to have evolved toward the type of commercial construction that would benefit if Measure R wins in November.

On the expenditure side, the Yes on R campaign reports having paid $1,500 to the Sierra Club’s San Francisco Bay Chapter for [campaign] literature; $20,922.30 to the campaign firm Terris Barnes Walters for literature (the trifold mailer designed to look as if it had come from the Sierra Club); and $755, also for literature, to Californians Vote Green of Los Angeles.

Why would the Yes on R campaign pay $755 to Californians Vote Green? Because CVG is a sleazy political promoter who will back anyone who pays. In June, CVG supported PG&E’s Proposition 16. Its new slate mailer for November just landed in Berkeley mailboxes. Naturally, it includes the endorsement Yes on Measure R*. In the bottom margin, the following legend was added in mousetype: “Appearance is paid for and authorized by each candidate and ballot measure which is designated by an *.”

Ten excellent reasons to Vote No on R

2010-10-12T11:01:00.000-07:00

Berkeley Planning Commissioner Gene Poschman, who knows the ins and outs of land-use politics better than anyone in town, wrote a position paper entitled Ten Excellent Reasons to Vote No on R.

Read it here.

“Sierra Club” Yes on R mailer financed by Sam Zell

2010-10-06T13:32:00.001-07:00

If you’re a Berkeley voter, you’ll have received the colorful mailer from the Yes on Measure R campaign conspicuously designed to look as if it had come from the Sierra Club.

Like Measure R itself, the mailer harps on the word “green” numerous times. Of course, there is nothing in the ballot language that guarantees any green (or even rosy) outcome for downtown Berkeley.

What we have here is a case of flagrant greenwashing, financed by developers.

California Form 460, Monetary Contributions Received, was made available yesterday. As of 30 September 2010, the Yes on Measure R campaign reports having received $32,450 in contributions.

By far the largest contribution—$25,000 (see a scan of the disclosure form)—was given by Equity Residential, an S&P 500 company and landlord to over 200,000 tenants nationwide.

Equity Residential’s chairman is Chicago billionaire Sam Zell (yes, he who bought and destroyed the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times).

Why would a Chicago real estate firm throw money into a Berkeley race? Because Equity Residential is one of downtown Berkeley’s largest landowners. In 2007, it acquired developer Patrick Kennedy’s portfolio of seven apartment buildings. Recently, the company purchased the Acheson properties on University Avenue between Shattuck and Walnut, where it plans a major development.

Equity Residential has a serious stake in Berkeley, and it’s anything but green.

Nor is the second-largest donor to Yes on Measure R a green environmentalist. In fact, he’s none other than the infamous Lakireddy Bali Reddy, major landlord, developer, and convicted importer of sex slaves.

The L.B. Reddy Estate Co., LLC, donated $2,500 to the Yes on Measure R campaign.

In third place is William Falik, who contributed $1,000.

Falik’s bio on the U.C. Berkeley Law School’s website tells us that he has “practiced land use, real estate, and environmental law and mediation in Northern California for the past 37 years and during this period he has pursued a dual career as attorney and real estate developer. [...] Currently, he is the Managing Partner of Westpark Community Builders which developed 1,500 acres in Roseville, California and planned and entitled 4300 residential units which were sold to the three largest builders in the United States. In addition, as CEO of Live Oak Enterprises, he has developed the Whitney Oaks master planned community in Rocklin, California with a championship Johnny Miller designed golf course and 2000 homes.”

And here’s an even more interesting fact about Falik, reported by Peter Byrne:

In the late 1980s, [developer Angelo] Tsakopoulos and [Phil] Angelides were trying to plow over protected vernal pools in the flood plains of Sacramento county. But their development projects were stalled due to federal and state environmental concerns. Suddenly, a real estate partnership called Live Oak Associates II bought up part of the flood plain adjacent to AKT Development’s land. Government disapproval of wetland development vaporized.

The land was lifted from the flood plain—on paper. Live Oak Associates II mysteriously obtained permission to roll over the wetlands.

Tied with Falik in third place is City Councilmember Gordon Wozniak, who also contributed $1,000.

Two contributors came in with $500 each:

Diablo Holdings Ltd. of Alamo, CA, is a property & asset management company representing The Lineweaver Trust, a private investment company (John L. Lineweaver is president of Diablo Holdings). The company manages real estate assets in Alamo and Berkeley, including the Cambridge Apartments at 2500 Durant Avenue and an office building at 2000 Center Street.

Marjorie Randolph, senior vice-president of Human Resources and Administration for The Walt Disney Studios in Burbank. She resides in Los Angeles.

Three contributors came in with $250 each:

S. Osborn Erickson, chairman of the Emerald Fund. On its website, the company claims to be “San Francisco’s premier real estate developer” and displays an array of large developments.

Julie Matlof Kennedy of Piedmont, a lawyer and lecturer at Stanford Law School, is married to Patrick Kennedy.

Jack Schafer of San Francisco is president of Jack Schafer Associates, which provides consulting services to shopping centers and department stores in Asia.

Liveable Berkeley contributed $200.

William Falik, Marjorie Randolph, S. Osborn Erickson, Julie Matlof Kennedy, and Jack Schafer have something else in common: they are all members of the Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s board of trustees.

Other Berkeley Rep trustees who contributed to Yes on R are John Field of San Francisco, retired chairman of Field Paoli Architects ($100); David Cox of San Francisco, former president and CEO of Cowles Media Company ($100); Sandra R. McCandless of Lafayette, a partner in the international law firm SNR Denton LLP (formerly Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal LLP) ($100); Thalia Dorwick of Oakland, an author and editor retired from McGraw-Hill Higher Education ($100); Jean Z. Strunsky of San Francisco, vice-president of administration and trustee of the Ira and Leonore Gershwin Trusts ($100); Kerry L. Francis of Oakland, former chairman of Deloitte Financial Advisory Services LLP’s Corporate Investigations practice ($100); David Hoffman, associate director of External Collaboration with the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute at Stanford University ($100); and Dale Rogers Marshall, president emerita of Wheaton College ($100).

The Rep’s managing director, Susan Medak, also contributed $100 to Yes on R.

That leaves one individual. Pamela Nichter of Novato, who is vice-president, COO and CFO of Osterweis Capital Management in San Francisco, contributed $100. Nichter and her husband are donors to the Berkeley Rep. In the Rep’s 2009 annual report, their donation is listed in the Directors category ($1,500–$2,999).

Julie and Patrick Kennedy’s donation to the Rep is listed in the Presidents category ($3,000–$5,999), and Kennedy’s Panoramic Interests is listed as a Berkeley Rep corporate sponsor, under gifts of $6,000–$11,999. S. Osborn “Oz” Erickson, who sits on the Rep’s finance committee with Julie Kennedy, is a donor in the Associate Producers category ($6,000–$11,999). Bill Falik, who is chair of the Rep’s facilities committee, donated even more. He and his wife are listed in the Executive Producers category ($25,000–$49,999). This might explain why Susan Medak is so eager to support Measure R.

And there you have it. These are the “green” individuals and companies who paid for the “Sierra Club” Yes on R mailer.

Garden Party to Benefit the McCreary-Greer House Maintenance Fund

2010-10-05T15:40:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson

McCreary-Greer House is badly in need of repairs and maintenance. In addition, the BAHA Board of Directors is committed to making our headquarters more compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Phase 1 of our plan calls for repaving the driveway and rebuilding the back porch. Phase 2 will include installing a lift and creating a wider entry door from the back porch. This door will replace the south window. We consider the changes minimal and believe that will not compromise the historic character of the house.

While BAHA currently has funds for Phase 1 of the project, we are fundraising for Phase 2. We launched our fundraising campaign on Sunday, 3 October 2010, with a garden party and barbecue whose proceeds are earmarked for the McCreary-Greer House Maintenance Fund.

See pictures of the event in our Photo Gallery

City Council candidates respond to BAHA’s questions

2010-09-28T14:58:00.001-07:00

In our ongoing effort to provide election information concerning preservation matters to BAHA members and the voting public, we invited the 14 candidates running for City Council to answer three questions relating to pressing preservation issues. Ten candidates responded, and their answers are published here, arranged numerically by district and alphabetically by candidate’s name.

We thank the candidates for taking time to respond, and we remind everyone that BAHA does not endorse candidates for public office.

Vote NO on Measure R

2010-09-27T19:33:00.000-07:00

Downtown Berkeley retains a historic context and a sense of place. It is still the center of our city. There are better models than Measure R for revitalizing our downtown.

Measure R:
♦ is fiscally irresponsible and full of vague statements.
♦ is not green—it takes approximately 65 years for a green,
energy-efficient new office building to recover the energy
lost in demolishing an existing building.
♦ will destroy our Landmarks Ordinance.
♦ will not bring back a vibrant and welcoming downtown.

Protect Berkeley’s Historic Main Street from:
♦ Manhattanization
♦ Corporate control
♦ Tax-revenue loss

Preserve Downtown Berkeley’s:
♦ Sense of place and harmony with neighborhoods
♦ Citizen participation
♦ Local opportunities for revenue

Measure R does nothing to bring back a vibrant and welcoming downtown. It is an attempt to gut our Landmarks Preservation Ordinance.

VOTE NO ON MEASURE R

Click here to download and print the flier.

Measure R Claims vs. Facts

2010-09-25T11:45:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson

The argument in favor of Measure R, Mayor Bates’ Downtown Area Plan, promises a “safe, vibrant and green Downtown Berkeley.” How much of the measure’s “Green Vision” promise can you believe?

Planner John English compares Measure R proponents’ deceptive wording, as quoted from the voter’s pamphlet, with what the measure itself does or doesn’t prescribe. Read his detailed analysis on the BAHA website.

Fall Downtown Walking Tours

2010-08-22T12:07:00.000-07:00

Berkeley High School Gymnasium (Olla Podrida, December 1932)

These tours are free of charge. Meeting points are indicated below. Questions? Please e-mail the BAHA office or call (510) 841-2242.

Thursday, 30 September 2010, 5:30 pm–7 pm
Main Street North—explore the expanded downtown area that is encroaching upon old residential neighborhoods.
Leader: Susan Cerny
Meet outside the Berkeley BART station.

Sunday, 3 October 2010, 11:00 am–12:30 pm
Civic Center—Berkeley’s only designated Historic District in the downtown area.
Leader: Daniella Thompson
Guest Co-leaders: Henrik Bull & Marie Bowman
Meet by the Civic Center Fountain.

Sunday, 17 October 2010, 11:00 am–12:30 pm
Acheson Block Neighborhood—The historic heart of downtown amid 21st-century developments.
Leader: Lesley Emmington
Meet at the northeast corner of University and Shattuck avenues.

Look for us at the Solano Stroll

2010-08-22T11:27:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 2007

Sunday, 12 September 2010. The BAHA booth will be located at 1758 Solano Avenue, between Colusa and Ensenada. Solano Stroll info.

Public library demolitions

2010-07-21T08:15:00.001-07:00

Adult reading room, South Berkeley Branch Library

We are dismayed to learn that the Library Board of Trustees is planning to demolish two branch libraries: West Berkeley and South Berkeley. The Library Bond Measure FF, which passed in the November 2008 election, promised an altogether different outcome. The ballot language specified that “bond proceeds would be limited to renovation, construction, seismic, and disabled access improvements, and expansion of program areas at the City’s four neighborhood branch libraries” and that “plans for renovation include restoration and refurbishment of historic features at the branch libraries as part of any renovation.”

The West Berkeley Branch Library (William K. Bartges, 1923) was designated a Structure of Merit in 2003, and any application for a demolition permit should require CEQA review and a public hearing before the Landmarks Preservation Commission.

The South Berkeley Branch Library, designed by John Hans Ostwald in 1960, is one of Berkeley’s Mid-Century Modern gems. Although not a designated landmark, it was identified as architecturally significant and is undergoing CEQA review (see the Initial Study). The building received the Berkeley Civic Arts Commission Community Award in 1965 and the American Institute of Architects/American Library Association Award of Merit in 1966.

Ostwald, who died at the age of 49 in 1973, designed other public buildings in Berkeley (the Bancroft Center and St. John’s Presbyterian Church are two) and numerous residences. His name guarantees immediate interest when one of his coveted residences is put on the market. In the the South Berkeley Library, Ostwald created an intimate structure on a domestic scale that fits within the surrounding neighborhood. The low building is constructed of concrete block (intended to be left unpainted) and has eaves broad enough to shelter the entrance walkway. The indoor-outdoor esthetic is further enhanced by an outdoor reading patio. The use of natural wood gives a feeling of warmth to the two reading rooms—one low-ceilinged and intimate, the other lit by a skylight in the apex of a high wood-paneled ceiling, whose four sloping sides dramatically echo the slope of the hip roof. The meeting room addition of 1974 was designed by Ostwald’s office, and its design is highly compatible with that of the original library.

In the Branch Libraries Facilities Master Plan released in July 2008, historic consultant Frederic Knapp stated that “Ostwald was a relatively prolific architect, achieving recognition in the region for designs exemplifying many contemporary architectural values. It appears the property is eligible to the California Register for its association with him and potentially for its design characteristics.”

In the same Facilities Master Plan, Noll & Tam Architects recommended the following (italics ours): Stabilization and repair: The exterior portions of the original building are among its most deteriorated features, though they appear very easy to restore. The concrete block, windows, trim, and other portions should be repaired and repainted as needed. Reversal of incompatible alterations: The adult reading room could be restored in large part by removal of the existing lighting, repair of the original ceiling, and replication of lost features. Restoration of the original lighting would measurably increase the historical integrity of the building in a way likely to be readily understood by many visitors. The same is true of the skylights.”

One alternative to demolition should be relocation of the library to a nearby site. We hope that the Environmental Impact Report will include an evaluation of alternative sites for a new library building and options for adaptive and sensitive reuse of the existing building.

See BAHA’s EIR scope comments.

Comments may be sent until 16 August 2010 at 5 pm to Aaron Sage, City of Berkeley Planning Dept., 2120 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704, or by e-mail to asage@cityofberkeley.info.

2010 Preservation Awards Winners

2010-06-20T19:52:00.001-07:00

Hurtig House (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2010)

On 27 May 2010, BAHA recognized 13 restoration and rehabilitation projects for their part in preserving Berkeley’s architectural heritage.

Read about the winning projects and see their photos in our Awards Gallery.

Chase Community Giving on Facebook

2010-06-19T08:06:00.001-07:00

Here’s your opportunity to help BAHA at no cost to yourself.

Chase Community Giving is giving away $5 million to non-profit organizations, and you help decide which 200 local charities receive donations.

Naturally, we’d like you to vote for the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association.

If you’re a Facebook user, please click here and vote today. July 12 is the last day you can vote.

If you’re not a Facebook user, please consider becoming one. BAHA needs your help.

Two Frank Lloyd Wright events

2010-05-26T12:56:00.001-07:00

Marin County Civic Center(photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

The Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy (FLWBC) is holding a lecture and a benefit dinner in Northern California on Saturday, 5 June 2010.

The lecture will take place at the Marin County Civic Center, Board of Supervisors Chamber (Room 329), in San Rafael and will begin at 11 am. Lynda Waggoner, Director of Fallingwater and FLWBC board member, will discuss the process of nominating the Civic Center building for listing as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as well as the particular merits that warrant the inclusion of the Civic Center (1957–1970) on this list.
Donation $10 (see event flier for details).

The same evening, people who are inclined to spend $1,000 ($650 of it tax deductible), can register for a private tour and dinner at the Walker House in Carmel. Details are available in the event brochure.

New Outing on Friday added

2010-05-13T19:37:00.001-07:00

Berkeley City Club (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

We’ve just added a tour of the fabulous Berkeley City Club to our Outings on Fridays series of guided architectural tours, organized by Sally Sachs. The tours take place on the first Friday of the month. Meet at 10:45 am. Lunch is optional and not included in the tour price. Advance reservations required. $15 per tour ($20 for Contemporary Jewish Museum) or $60 for four.

See full details and purchase tickets through our Events Calendar.

Friday, 4 June 2010
11:00 am
Shadelands Ranch Historical Museum
2660 Ygnacio Valley Road
Walnut Creek
$15

Friday, 9 July 2010
11:00 am
Shinn Historic Park and Arboretum
1251 Peralta Blvd.
Fremont
$15

Friday, 6 August 2010
11:00 am
Berkeley City Club
2315 Durant Avenue
$15

Friday, 10 Sept. 2010
11:00 am
The Contemporary Jewish Museum
736 Mission Street
San Francisco
$20

House Tour photo gallery

2010-05-05T14:56:00.001-07:00

Selden Williams House (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2010)

Our Julia Morgan House Tour on Sunday, 2 May 2010, was a great success. Photos from the tour are now available for viewing in the Photo Gallery.

The Goddards and Julia Morgan

2010-04-23T22:25:00.001-07:00

2615, 2617, and 2619 Parker Street, designed by Julia Morgan for Louise Goddard in 1905. (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2010)

Who were Julia Morgan’s most loyal Berkeley clients? Odds are on the Goddards, for whom she designed eight houses. One of these will be open at our Spring House Tour on Sunday, 2 May 2010. Also open will be two houses modeled on the Goddard tour house.

Who were the Goddards? Read about them in The Goddards and Julia Morgan: An Occasional Love Story.

April walking & driving tours in Berkeley

2010-04-02T22:27:00.001-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson

Saturday, 10 April 2010 at 10:30 am
Maybeck Country
Tour guide: Jane Edginton
A walking tour of Buena Vista Hill with an expert on this district.
$15 per person
Maximum 20 participants

Photo: Daniella Thompson

Thursday, 22 April 2010, 5:00–7:00 pm
Hidden Berkeley—Peralta Park to Northlands
Tour guide: Susan Cerny
A walking tour through two quiet North-Central Berkeley neighborhoods with the author of Berkeley Landmarks and An Architectural Guidebook to San Francisco and the Bay Area.
$15 per person
Maximum 20 participants

Photo: Daniella Thompson

Call tour leader for date & time: (510) 524-4005
Explore Berkeley’s Creeks
Tour guide: Carole Schemmerling
A car-pool tour, surveying Berkeley’s daylighted creeks with a co-founder of the Urban Creeks Council.
$15 per person
Maximum 10 participants

To order tickets, mail a check made out to BAHA, indicating the tour(s) of your choice, to:
BAHA
April Walking Tours
P.O. Box 1137
Berkeley, CA 94701

You may also purchase tickets online. Please specify your tour date(s) in the Description line. (See instructions for using PayPal.)

Cheney House reduced to rubble

2010-03-29T17:56:00.001-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 26 March 2010

Last week, U.C. tore down the landmark Warren and May Cheney House (1885) at 2241 College Avenue, on campus. Last fall, the University of California’s Real Estate Services Group issued a request for proposals for the purchase and relocation of the house. No buyer came forward, and the university took advantage of the Spring Break to demolish it.

Still standing is the second Cheney house, built in 1902 by Carl Ericsson. It is located next door, at 2243 College Avenue, and can be seen in the photo above. The house has been acquired and will be moved to 62nd Street in South Berkeley.

In the matter of 2707 Rose Street

2010-03-27T10:30:00.000-07:00

Photo: Berkeleyside

By now, practically everybody in Berkeley knows that on 28 January, the Zoning Adjustments Board approved a use permit for a nearly 10,000-square-foot house and garage at 2707 Rose Street. The story got national play because the property owners are Mitch Kapor and Freada Kapor Klein.

Along the way, some very basic preliminaries fell through the cracks. The Structure History report submitted on 19 May 2009 claims that “there is no architect of record and no associated persons of historical interest” for the existing structure on the property. Both assertions are wrong.

As it turns out, the existing house at 2707 Rose Street did have an architect with excellent credentials, as well as a notable first owner.

Find out who they were in BAHA’s letter to the City Council. The Berkeley Daily Planet published my commentary, If You Don’t Want to Find Anything, Don’t Look Anywhere.

For background information on the ZAB decision and neighbors’ appeal, see 2707rose.org.

Two pre-House Tour lectures

2010-03-23T11:30:00.001-07:00

Our Spring House Tour, Looking at Julia Morgan: Early Residences in Berkeley, will be preceded by two interesting lectures.

The first lecture, to take place at the Berkeley City Club (Julia Morgan, 1929), will feature architectural historian Betty Marvin, well-known for appearing as Miss Morgan (see photo on left), as well as for her thorough knowledge of the architect’s life and work.

The second talk will occur a week later at the Hillside Club. Inge Horton, author of the upcoming book Early Women Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area: The Lives and Work of Fifty Professionals, 1890–1950, will give an illustrated lecture on Julia Morgan’s cohorts.

A Visit with Julia Morgan
An impersonation by Betty Marvin
Thursday, 22 April 2010 at 7:30 pm
Berkeley City Club
Members’ Lounge (2nd floor)
2315 Durant Avenue, Berkeley
Tickets $15

Julia Morgan’s Cohorts
Speaker: Inge Horton
Thursday, 29 April 2010 at 7:30 pm
The Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley
Tickets $15

Advance tickets may be purchased by mail or online. See our 2010 Spring House Tour page for details.

On Photoplayers and bakeries in West Berkeley

2010-03-10T21:32:00.001-08:00

Joe Rinaudo plays his Fotoplayer, manufactured in 1926 at the Van Nuys plant.

The contraption you see in the video above was developed and first manufactured in Berkeley by the American Photo Play Company, which opened its factory on the corner of Addison and Bonar Streets in 1912. It remained at this location until 1925.

But photoplayers (so named because they served to accmpany silent films) were only one type of product manufactured on the block that now makes Strawberry Creek Park. To learn about the history of this block, read Bread and Music Were Staples of West Berkeley Block.

Our 2010 House Tour: Looking at Julia Morgan

2010-03-07T16:06:00.001-08:00

Photos: Daniella Thompson, 2010

BAHA’s next house tour is devoted to everybody’s favorite architect. Looking at Julia Morgan: Early Residences in Berkeley will take place on Sunday 2 May 2010.

A pre-tour lecture on California Women Architects will be given on Thursday, 29 April 2010, at 7:30 pm, at the Hillside Club. The speaker is Inge Horton, author of the upcoming book Early Women Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area: The Lives and Work of Fifty Professionals, 1890–1950.

For complete information and ticket orders, visit the 2010 House Tour page. Tour docents receive complimentary admission. To volunteer, e-mail BAHA.

Outings on Fridays

2010-02-23T14:42:00.000-08:00

Shadelands Ranch Historical Museum (courtesy of the Walnut Creek Historical Society)

Our popular series of guided architectural tours, organized by Sally Sachs, returns this spring. The tours take place on the first Friday of the month. Meet at 10:45 am. Lunch is optional and not included in the tour price. Advance reservations required. $15 per tour ($20 for Contemporary Jewish Museum) or $45 for three.

Friday, 5 March 2010
11:00 am
Grace Cathedral
1100 California Street
San Francisco
$15

Friday, 4 June 2010
11:00 am
Shadelands Ranch Historical Museum
2660 Ygnacio Valley Road
Walnut Creek
$15

Friday, 9 July 2010
11:00 am
Shinn Historic Park and Arboretum
1251 Peralta Blvd.
Fremont
$15

Friday, 10 Sept. or 1 Oct. 2010
11:00 am
The Contemporary Jewish Museum
736 Mission Street
San Francisco
$20

See full details and purchase tickets through our Events Calendar.

“Designing with Nature” film premiere

2010-02-16T19:31:00.001-08:00

BAHA will hold the premiere screening of the documentary “Designing with Nature: Arts & Crafts Architecture in Northern California” on Wednesday, 31 March 2010, at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley, CA 94709.

A reception will be offered at 7:00 pm, followed by the program at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $25 in advance and $30 at the door.

“Designing with Nature” was written, produced, and directed by Emmy Award winner Paul Bockhorst in cooperation with BAHA. Mr. Bockhorst and architectural historian Robert Judson Clark will speak after the screening. The reception will continue following the program.

See full details and purchase advance tickets through our Events Calendar.

Laurie Vern Bright, 1942–2010

2010-01-26T11:01:00.000-08:00

Laurie Bright, BAHA board member and preservation stalwart, passed away on Sunday, 24 January 2010, after a protracted illness.

A past chair of the Landmarks Preservation Commission, Laurie led many battles on behalf of Berkeley’s heritage. In 2006, he co-chaired the Measure J campaign against the City Council’s attempt to weaken the Landmarks Preservation Ordinance. That campaign failed but was redeemed two years later with the successful referendum Save the LPO—No on LL. In 2009, Laurie co-led another successful campaign—the referendum on the City Council’s Downtown Area Plan.

A longtime West Berkeley resident and the owner of an auto repair shop on San Pablo Avenue, Laurie found time to be a community leader, serving as president of the Council of Neighborhood Associations and editor of the CNA Newsleter.

Laurie & Tamlyn Bright at the “Maybeck Country” house tour, 3 May 2009 (photo: Daniella Thompson)

Laurie Vern Bright was born on 22 May 1942 in Los Angeles. He grew up in Sacramento and came to Berkeley in 1974. In 1981, Laurie married Tamlyn Schafer. The couple was a regular fixture at BAHA’s annual house tours, always tending a ticket table in front of one of the tour houses.

BAHA remembers Laurie with gratitude. Our heartfelt condolences go out to Tamlyn and the family.

Original windows matter. Don’t replace, repair!

2010-01-21T17:30:00.001-08:00

Courtesy of the National Trust for Historic Preservation

Are you considering replacing the original windows in your home? Before you do anything, read this article from the National Trust for Historic Preservation:

Windows are the most visible, yet commonly under-appreciated components of older and historic homes and buildings.

While being very beautiful, original historic windows also serve a great purpose—they impart a building’s inside-outside connection. They provide ventilation and light, and can function as emergency egress. Above all, they offer clues to a building's history because they are integral aspects of architectural design.

However, despite all of these attributes, windows are an easy target and are all too often blamed for energy loss. Commonly, people jump to replace their historic windows because companies promise that their replacement windows will not only save them time and money, but that their products and services are the “green” thing to do. In fact, a thriving industry has grown around the perceived need to replace rather than restore.

Have you ever wondered why there are no replacement fireplaces? Fireplaces with ill-fitting or missing dampers leak more heat than windows do, but salesmen don’t leave flyers for new dampers in your mailbox, do they?

One reason why it is tempting for homeowners to replace their original historic windows is because they can immediately see a difference when a window is replaced. And, even though a project like sealing air leaks will ultimately save more energy than replacing windows, there is relatively low demand for air-sealing services. As Tom Kenny, manager of C&O Conservation, has said, “I provide something that is invisible.”

The following frequently asked questions are intended to not only inform and inspire, but to demonstrate how you can keep your old windows, achieve energy efficiency, and be “green” throughout the process.

On the same page you will find the following useful guides:

Kenneth Harvey Cardwell, 1920–2010

2010-01-19T23:26:00.001-08:00

Ken & Mary Cardwell at the Berkeley History Center (photo: Stephen Rosen, 1999)

Kenneth Harvey Cardwell, Bay Area architect and Professor Emeritus of Architecture at U.C. Berkeley, died on 11 January 2010 in Oakland at age 89. Born in Los Angeles in 1920, his ancestors on the paternal side were owners of Spanish-Mexican land grants in Southern California. He served with distinction during WWII as 2nd Lt. in the 35th Fighter Squadron and later chronicled his wartime efforts in a book called How Father Won the War.

A long-time Berkeley resident, Cardwell was a U.C. Berkeley alumnus (1947), majoring in architecture. He first worked in private-practice firms and then became principal architect in the firm Kolbeck, Cardwell and Christopherson. In 1949, he began his teaching career at U.C., where he created courses in architectural history and historic preservation. An authority on renowned architect Bernard Maybeck, whom he first befriended as a student at U.C., Cardwell wrote the acclaimed Bernard Maybeck: Artisan, Architect, Artist (1977, 1996). He was elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects for his services to the organization and to the profession.

Among his activities in various Berkeley civic organizations, he was elected President of the Berkeley Historical Society (1997–1999) and later became Chief Archivist, remaining in that position until his retirement in 2009. During his time as Archivist, he organized and computerized the Historical Society archives. Some other activities Cardwell accomplished for the Historical Society included writing the column “75 Years Ago,” (now “A Look Back”) for several years for the Berkeley Voice; curating many exhibits, such as “Berkeley Literary Scene” and “One Hundred Years of Artists in Berkeley”; and leading a variety of walking tours. He leaves behind many friends and associates in that organization. A comprehensive oral history focusing on the life of Kenneth Harvey Cardwell is in progress at the Berkeley Historical Society.

A memorial service was conducted at St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church in North Berkeley on Saturday, 16 January, followed by a reception at the Cardwell family home in Berkeley. Cardwell is survived by his wife Mary Elinor (Sullivan) Cardwell, five children, nine grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

– Therese Pipe

Ken was absolutely dedicated to the Berkeley Historical Society and to organizing the archives. He worked with determination for many, many years. He ran a tight ship at the beginning, but gradually other volunteers helped him with the responsibilities of running the Society. Ken lobbied to keep BHS a neutral organization that was dedicated to collecting, preserving, researching, and making available the history of Berkeley. He felt that that way, both sister organizations could best serve the community through a combination of BAHA’s advocacy and BHS’s neutrality. He curated outstanding exhibits on Berkeley artists, writers, architects, the fire department, and past and present landmarks. He wrote the BHS Newsletter, led architectural and historical walking tours, and gave lectures on Berkeley architects. BHS volunteers also looked forward to Ken and Mary Cardwell’s gatherings in their Berkeley Maybeck home and in Inverness. It is clear that Ken Cardwell has made an invaluable contribution to Berkeley history and architecture.

– Linda Rosen

Berkeley Iceland nominated to the National Register

2010-01-15T18:42:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of saveberkeleyiceland.org

Berkeley Iceland, which was designated a City of Berkeley landmark in 2007, is going back to the City Council for a public hearing on 19 January 2010. The building’s owners, East Bay Iceland, Inc., filed a lawsuit against the city last October, challenging the landmark designation. Under the settlement agreement, the council is to rescind and vacate its July 2007 decision to affirm the LPC’s landmark designation, then hold a new public hearing and make a decision as to the designation of Berkeley Iceland as a City of Berkeley landmark. (Read Heated Battle Over Iceland’s Landmark Status in the Berkeley Daily Planet.)

The Landmarks Preservation Commission was not informed of the new review and has sent a letter to the City Council, questioning the unpredecented process and pointing out that no law supporting the new hearing is to be found in Berkeley’s Landmarks Preservation Ordinance.

A few months ago, BAHA asked retired planner John English to write a nomination of the Berkeley Iceland to the National Register of Hitoric Places. This nomination was sent to Sacramento on Tuesday, 12 January.

All concerned Berkeleyans should make an effort to appear before the council on 19 January and speak in favor of preserving this important landmark.

El Cerrito’s Architectural Heritage

2010-01-08T14:11:00.000-08:00

An illustrated talk by Dave Weinstein

Sunday, 24 January 2010
El Cerrito Senior Center
6500 Stockton Avenue (behind the library)
Info: (510) 524-1737

Free admission

Learn about El Cerrito’s surprisingly rich architectural history, including buildings by such star Bay Area architects as John Hudson Thomas and Walter Ratcliff. One of the world’s leading modernists, Richard Neutra, designed a house in El Cerrito, and the city’s hills are particularly rich in wonderful mid-century modern homes.

Visit intact neighborhoods from several different eras that give El Cerrito much of it charm and character. Hear about the city’s most beautiful street, chock-a-block with picturesque Storybook houses. See the city’s cutest rustic cabin. Enjoy a church designed by Frank Lloyd Wright’s son, and admire what could be the nicest mid-century modern school in the East Bay.

Dave Weinstein is the author of Signature Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Save the (Berkeley Daily) Planet

2010-01-06T17:53:00.000-08:00

The Omni, formerly the Ligure Club (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

Artists for Change is hosting a benefit party for the Berkeley Daily Planet on Sunday, 24 January 2010, from 4:30 to 7:30 pm. The venue is the Omni (formerly the Ligure Club) at 4799 Shattuck Avenue in Oakland’s Temescal district.

There'll be live jazz and Brazilian music, good food and drink, beautiful people, and fabulous items on silent auction.

Music by
Grupo Falso Baiano
Faye Carol and Sista Kee
Verismo Opera

$50 singles/$90 couples at the door; $45/$80 in advance.

Complete information and advance tickets are available at berkeleydailyplanet.com/benefit.

Our holiday open house

2009-12-26T11:07:00.001-08:00

Anthony Bruce & Susan Cerny (photo: Steven Finacom)

BAHA celebrated the publication of 41 Berkeley Walking Tours with a holiday open house on 10 December.

As of this writing, the first printing is nearly sold out. A second printing will be available by the end of January.

Photos: Steven Finacom

BAHA Open House

2009-11-16T15:25:00.000-08:00

On Thursday, 10 December, BAHA will hold a holiday open house to celebrate the publication of our new and greatly expanded perennial favorite, now titled 41 Berkeley Walking Tours (see details about the book).

The new book, along with other fine publications, will be available for purchase at BAHA, as well as at local bookstores.

Refreshments will be served. We look forward to your visit!

Thursday, 10 December 2009
4:30–7:00 pm
McCreary-Greer House
2318 Durant Avenue, Berkeley

41 Berkeley Walking Tours

2009-11-15T19:28:00.000-08:00

Berkeley’s hidden neighborhoods and architectural treasures come to life in this authoritative guidebook. Discover 1,500 noteworthy buildings and their backgrounds, legacy of the city’s fascinating 150-year history.

41 Berkeley Walking Tours: Architectural Walks Through the University Town is BAHA’s new, completely revised and updated replacement for the popular 41 Walking Tours of Berkeley, Cal.

This book includes entirely new walks, with a short history of each area and a brief description of each building. Each walking tour receives a two-page spread with an introduction, map, and photo of a representative building. Some pages offer tips for detours to nearby attractions.

In addition, the book provides a concise history of Berkeley, a résumé of its prominent architects and builders, and a pictorial compendium of common architectural styles.

See a list of the walking tours, a sample page, and sample entries here.

Kenney Cottage Community Garden Groundbreaking

2009-11-01T09:34:00.000-08:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson

Saturday, 31 October 2009, was Groundbreaking Day for the Kenney Cottage Community Garden at 1631 Fifth Street. The narrow lot, zoned MU-R (Mixed-Use Residential), has been owned by the Berkeley Redevelopment Agency for several decades. BAHA targeted it as the ideal site for the historic Kenney Cottage, which has been temporarily parked at 1275 University Avenue since 2003.

Several years ago, BAHA submitted a proposal to the West Berkeley Project Area Committee (WBPAC), which is charged with assisting the Berkeley Redevelopment Agency in the completion of the West Berkeley Redevelopment Project. After deliberating over a number of options for the lot, the committee recommended that it be made a community resource.

BAHA partnered with the Northern California Land Trust (NCLT), which has leased the lot from the Berkeley Redevelopment Agency.

Neighbors of the site created Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden, enlisting the assistance of the Ecology Center’s Berkeley Community Gardening Collaborative (BCGC).

Representatives of all the above organizations were on hand to celebrate the groundbreaking, as volunteers, including members of the Kappa Alpha fraternity, built garden-bed boxes in the rear of the lot, planted trees and shrubs along the fence, and sowed a cover crop.

See a photo gallery of the event.

BAHA Fall Walking Tours

2009-08-09T15:50:00.000-07:00

Claremont Creekside (Anthony Bruce)

In conjunction with our revised and expanded edition of the popular 41 Walking Tours of Berkeley, we’ll be leading a series of five walking tours in select Berkeley neighborhoods. All tours take place on a Saturday from 10 am to noon. Tour limit: 25 participants.

Members: $10 per tour / $40 for the series
General: $15 per tour / $50 for the series

Saturday, 19 September 2009
10:00 am–Noon
Dwight Way Station: The Downtown That Never Was
Leader: Steven Finacom

Nineteenth-century business boosters tried unsuccessfully to shift the center of Berkeley’s Downtown several blocks south to Dwight Way Station. They failed, and instead the area became today’s district of fascinating Victorian homes, small-scale commercial buildings, and nearly forgotten historic sites at the intersection of Downtown, the Southside, the Le Conte neighborhood, and the areas west of Shattuck Avenue. Walk is level and accessible, along sidewalks.

Saturday, 26 September 2009
10:00 am–Noon
West Berkeley
Leader: Stephanie Manning

Berkeley’s oldest district, once the independent town of Ocean View, abounds in historic relics and early Victorian architecture, retaining its charming village-like character. Walk is level and accessible, along sidewalks.

Saturday, 3 October 2009
10:00 am–Noon
North-Central Berkeley
Leader: Daniella Thompson

This little-explored area was farmland until the trains came to Berkeley in 1876. It was settled by laborers and tradesmen—some of them quite prosperous—as well as by prominent politicians, architects, and businessmen. In the 20th century, the district housed its share of well-known poets. In the architectural mix are Victorian, shingled Arts & Crafts, Art Deco, and modern buildings, but the dominant style is Colonial Revival, fashionable between 1895 and 1905. Walk is level and accessible, along sidewalks.

Saturday , 10 October 2009
10:00 am–Noon
Claremont Creekside SOLD OUT
Leader: Anthony Bruce

When Claremont was conceived in the early 1900s, much of Berkeley had been subdivided in the traditional grid pattern without regard for the topography, and creeks had been buried. Why not create a “residential park,” wrote Duncan McDuffie in Claremont’s promotional brochure of 1905, “where the delightful contours of the land are kept intact, the streets curved and parked, and lots are all generous in size, and so laid out as to be planned for homesites, with oaks and a bit of creek, perhaps?” No doubt, the creek-traversed lots were an inspiration to creativity, as the varied configuration of the creek called for unique solutions in home design. Walk is level but not wheelchair accessible.

Saturday, 17 October 2009
10:00 am–Noon
Berkeley Villa Tract
Leader: Susan Cerny

This walk takes us along Codornices Creek through the center of the Berkeley Villa Tract, part of Napoleon Bonaparte Byrne’s 800-acre farm, which was subdivided in 1873. By 1877, Henry B. Berryman owned all of the Villa Tract, Byrne’s house, and the reservoir just west of Euclid Avenue. Walk is moderate, requiring some climbing. Not wheelchair accessible.

To order tickets, print, fill out, and mail the ticket order form.
You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify number of tickets and walk date[s] in the Description line.

Preservation at Work :: Fall Lecture Series

2009-08-09T09:01:00.000-07:00

Municipal Rose Garden (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Our fall lecture series is a fundraiser to benefit the Kenney Cottage Restoration Fund.

Tickets: $15 per lecture; $40 for the series
All lectures will take place at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley, CA 94709.

Wednesday, 21 October 2009
7:30 pm
Gray Brechin :: A New Deal for the East Bay: Excavating the Buried Civilization of the Great Depression
New Deal public works agencies that put thousands of men and women to work transformed Berkeley and its sister cities within less than a decade, providing us with schools, parks and recreational facilities, and vital infrastructure from which we all continue to benefit. Gray Brechin will show what California's Living New Deal Project—partially supported by U.C. Berkeley Institute for Research on Labor and Employment—has discovered so far.

Dr. Gray Brechin is an historical geographer, a frequent radio and television guest, and a popular public speaker. He is currently a visiting scholar in the U.C. Berkeley Department of Geography and founder and project scholar of California’s Living New Deal Project.

Wednesday, 4 November 2009
7:30 pm
Jane Powell :: Smart Growth, Green Buildings & Other Oxymorons
The speaker takes aim at developers and local planning officials who’ve been propagating urban infill developments by spouting the smart-growth party line about how their developments are “smarter” than paving over farmland or will consist of buildings that are “greener” than the old bungalows or commercial buildings that are still standing in early-20th-century neighborhoods.

Labeled “the bad girl of bungalow writing,” Jane Powell is a restoration consultant, house restorer, lecturer, and author of six books, including Bungalow Kitchens, Bungalow Bathrooms, Bungalow Details: Exterior, Bungalow Details: Interior, Bungalow: The Ultimate Arts and Crafts Home, and Linoleum.

Wednesday, 18 November 2009
7:30 pm
Paul Groth :: Ordinary Storefronts of the Twentieth Century: Clues to the Local Histories of Shopping and Retailing
If we learn their historical vocabulary, store windows tell us much more than what is for sale inside a building. Using examples from the Bay Area and from elsewhere in the U.S., this lecture outlines changing forms used in the design and remodeling of everyday shop windows—and how these changes provide visual clues to the history of local retail investment, shopping culture, gender roles, and the vitality of neighborhood and downtown shopping districts.

Paul Groth is Professor of U.S. Built Environment History at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has served on the faculties of the geography, architecture, and American studies departments since 1983. His most recent book, Everyday America: Cultural Landscape Studies after J. B. Jackson (co-edited with Chris Wilson) was published in 2003 by the University of California Press.

To order tickets, print, fill out, and mail the ticket order form.
You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify number of tickets and lecture date[s] in the Description line.

First Church of Christ, Scientist Centennial Lecture

2009-08-09T08:32:00.001-07:00

The sanctuary (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2007)

Inventing a Mastework: Bernard Maybeck and the First Church of Christ, Scientist, Berkeley, 1909–1911.

Speaker: Robert Judson Clark

This is the first event of a two-year observance of the centennial of the unusual building on the corner of Dwight Way and Bowditch Street. Maybeck was selected as architect in the fall of 1909. The first services in the new structure were held in August 1911. Clark will discuss the choice of architect, as well as the collaboration between the committee members, builders, and craftspeople who produced this audacious landmark of modern eclecticism.

Robert Judson Clark is a professor emeritus of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University. He is the author of The Arts and Crafts Movement in America 1876–1916 and Design in America: the Cranbrook vision, 1925–1950.

Thursday, 8 October 2009
7:30 pm
First Church of Christ, Scientist
2619 Dwight Way, Berkeley, CA 94704

This event is being co-sponsored by the Friends of First Church.

Tickets: $15. To order tickets, visit our Events Calendar or use the ticket order form.

You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify number of tickets and lecture date[s] in the Description line.

Learn how to fix double-hung windows

2009-08-09T08:14:00.000-07:00

Architect and BAHA board member Shawn Smith will lead a hands-on workshop in which you can learn how to repair your double-hung wooden windows. The workshop will be conducted on Saturday, 12 September 2009, 2 pm, at BAHA’s McCreary-Greer House, 2318 Durant Avenue. Cost: $15. Advance registration required. To register, send an e-mail to BAHA or call (510) 841-2242.

The carpenter, the baker, and the Classics professor

2009-07-24T13:39:00.000-07:00

Moran-Wright house, 2001 Francisco Street
(photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

The sky-blue Victorian villa—part Stick-Eastlake, part Gothic Revival, and proudly holding aloft a tower and weathervane on the northeastern corner of Francisco and Milvia Streets—is a striking sight.

Passersby who know nothing of its storied past are often captivated by the rows of cobalt-blue glass bottles lined along its window sills. If they raise their eyes, they may admire the handsomely proportioned windows, the classically balustraded balcony, and the numerous curved brackets gracing the house.

This edifice, popularly known as the Flagg House, has long been the subject of local legends, some of them propagated by local historians.

Read the whole story here.

Beltane Ranch: From ‘Dusty Place’ to ‘Mammy’s Place’

2009-07-06T16:18:00.000-07:00

Beltane Ranch, Glen Ellen (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

Before there was a Glen Ellen, much of Sonoma County’s Valley of the Moon was part of the 18,833-acre Rancho Los Guilucos. The rancho—its name was later corrupted to Guilicos—was granted in 1837 by Gov. Juan Bautista Alvarado to John Wilson and his wife, Ramona Carrillo, sister-in-law of General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo.

In the late 1870s, Captain John Hamilton Drummond established his Dunfillan Vineyard on 150 acres of the rancho. After his death, the land was acquired by the wealthiest black woman in San Francisco, Mary Ellen Pleasant, widely known as “Mammy” Pleasant and now called the “Mother of Civil Rights in California.”

Read the whole story here.

In Glen Ellen, a Pig Palace, a Wolf House, and other wonders

2009-06-27T12:48:00.000-07:00

Jack and Charmian London at Beauty Ranch (Bancroft Library, University of California)

The hamlet of Glen Ellen, in Sonoma County’s Valley of the Moon, numbers fewer than a thousand inhabitants. In compensation, it is rich in scenic beauty and historic interest. Not the least interesting local resident was Jack London (1876–1916), who first bought land here in 1905. In those days, London was America’s best-known and most highly paid writer. His discovery of Glen Ellen came about through a Berkeley connection.

Read the full story here.

BAHA 2009 Preservation Awards

2009-06-17T20:44:00.000-07:00

Edgar Dorsey Taylor House (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

The 2009 edition of the BAHA Preservation Awards is online.

This year, the winners’ range of ages and styles is broader than ever. The oldest house was built in 1890, the youngest in 1993. Architectural styles vary from Victorian to ultra-modern, from Arts & Crafts to International Style. Among the honorees are three apartment buildings, a cottage built of Thermotite, a dwelling clad in plywood, and another that used to be plywood-clad but is now partially covered with modular cement panels.

These award-winning projects are a credit to the spirit and ingenuity of their owners, designers, and craftspeople, and an example to us all.

Rustic Traditions in Southern California’s Mountain Resorts

2009-06-15T18:00:00.001-07:00

Eloc Lodge, Idyllwild, CA (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

What traits do the resorts of the San Jacinto and San Bernardino Mountains share with the Adirondacks? Log construction, native stone work, and decorative work in twigs, branches, and bark.

Unlike the Adirondack Park—the largest publicly protected area in the contiguous United States, created in 1892 by the State of New York to remain “forever wild”—Southern California’s scenic mountains are administered by a patchwork of federal and state agencies, Indian reservations, and private entities.

Not many of the old Southern California log houses are still standing, but several fine examples can be found in Idyllwild, at the foot of Tahquitz Rock, and Fawnskin, on the northern shore of Big Bear Lake.

See them here.

If Julia Morgan could see the Berkeley City Club now

2009-06-05T09:53:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004

What is steel-reinforced concrete? How was the multi-story Berkeley City Club building constructed in these materials? How could it have been completed in only 11 months in 1929-30 without modern construction equipment? Are these ceilings and beams really formed concrete? How were the beautiful columns and ornamental details crafted? Is this building method secure and seismically strong? Could this building and these decorative elements be replicated today?

John Maillard, concrete specialist (JFM Enterprises Inc., Waterproofing and Restoration Services), will address these questions and more at a lecture sponsored by the Landmark Heritage Foundation.

Free admission.

Monday, 8 June 2009, 7 pm
Berkeley City Club Drawing Room
2315 Durant Ave., Berkeley
(510) 848-7800; (510) 883-9710

Maybeck Country: 2009 House Tour photo gallery

2009-05-14T10:21:00.000-07:00

Maybeck Cottage (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

Despite the threat of rain, our Maybeck Country spring house tour on 3 May proved to be a highly rewarding and memorable event.

See photos of the tour in our online gallery.

Mayor Bates to visit proposed Kenney Cottage site

2009-04-08T12:43:00.000-07:00

Kenney cottage on the move down Addison St. in 1906
(photo courtesy of the Berkeley Firefighters Association provided by Richard Schwartz)

Patty Marcks of Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden writes:

Please come out to show Berkeley’s Mayor Tom Bates that you support this project for the city-owned vacant lot on Fifth Street in northwest Berkeley. Tell your friends and neighbors.

When: Monday, 13 April 2009, 3:45 pm. The mayor is scheduled to arrive around 4 pm.
Where: Front yard of 1629 Fifth Street, next door to the site of the proposed project (between Virginia & Cedar Streets).
Who: Neighborhood residents and other Berkeley supporters of Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden; the Mayor; representatives of the project’s two development partners, Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association (BAHA) and Northern California Land Trust (NCLT).

Don’t forget to come to the West Berkeley PAC meeting later the same week, on Thursday, 16 April 7 pm at James Kenney Recreation Center, 7th & Virginia Streets.

Cathedral of Christ the Light

2009-04-04T13:12:00.000-07:00

Photo: Pam Strayer, 2009

A record crowd of 77 people turned out yesterday for BAHA’s outing to the Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland. Pam Strayer, a contributor to the John Hudson Thomas Journal, went on the tour and recorded it in a beautiful set of photographs that she published on Flickr.

The photos are also available as a slideshow.

Timothy Pflueger Day in SF

2009-03-20T14:46:00.000-07:00

Timothy L. Pflueger in 1936, sketched by Peter
van Valkenburg (Wikipedia)

Sunday, 22 March 2009 will be proclaimed Timothy Pflueger Day by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. The architect (1892–1946), who was born in San Francisco and lived there all his life, is having a street named after him.

Chelsea Place, an alley jutting south from the 600 block of Bush Street between Powell and Stockton streets (and located directly behind the Pflueger-designed 450 Sutter skyscraper), will henceforth be known as Pflueger Place.

The proclamation will be read at noon on Sunday at the entrance to Pflueger Place (641 Bush Street). Pflueger family members, SF city officials, former Board supervisors, local architectural historians, author Therese Poletti, and Art Deco lovers will will break champagne bottles on or near the street sign.

Three of Pflueger’s Berkeley buildings, all located at Shattuck Square, are designated landmarks.

From Maybeck to Modern :: House Tour Lecture Series

2009-03-18T12:45:00.001-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009

In conjunction with our Spring House Tour, Maybeck Country: Hillside Houses of the Early- and Mid-20th Century, we are offering the three-lecture series From Maybeck to Modern.

Tickets: $15 per lecture; $40 for the series
All lectures will take place at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley, CA 94709.

Wednesday, 8 April 2009
7:30 pm
Robert Judson Clark :: Buena Vista: Maybeck and the Year 1907
Many of Bernard Maybeck’s finest residential designs, including his own house on Buena Vista Way, were created in this watershed year.

Robert Judson Clark is a professor emeritus of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University. He is the author of The Arts and Crafts Movement in America 1876–1916 and Design in America: the Cranbrook vision, 1925–1950.

Wednesday, 22 April 2009
7:30 pm
Henrik Bull :: Bay Area Architecture of the 1950s and 1960s
Bay Area mid-century architecture as seen through the eyes of an architect who began his practice here during the 1950s.

Henrik Bull is founder and principal of Bull Stockwell Allen/BSA Architects.

Wednesday, 29 April 2009
7:30 pm
Waverly Lowell :: Greenwood Common: Living Modern
The story of William Wurster and his iconic development of mid-century houses surrounding a landscaped common overlooking the Golden Gate.

Waverly Lowell is Curator of the Environmental Design Archives at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of Living Modern: A Biography of Greenwood Common, to be published by William Stout this spring.

To order tickets, print, fill out, and mail the ticket order form.
You can also pay fo by credit card via PayPal. Please specify number of tickets and lecture date[s] in the Description line.

Maybeck Country :: BAHA Spring House Tour

2009-03-17T12:19:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004

Our 34th Spring House Tour, Maybeck Country: Hillside Houses of the Early- and Mid-20th Century, will take place on Sunday, 3 May 2009, from 1 to 5 pm.

For information and tickets, see the tour page.

The Montealegre House: a mystery solved

2009-03-10T14:49:00.000-07:00

The Montealegre House, 2601 Dana Street (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)

The stately Italianate house at the southeast corner of Dana and Parker streets has long been believed to be the Hillegass House. Some years ago, BAHA board member Jerry Sulliger began to question the claim that this house had originally been built on Hillegass property. Jerry’s subsequent extensive research revealed an even more fascinating history connected with this Victorian, now known to be the Montealegre House.

Jerry’s article was published in the current BAHA Newsletter (No. 130). An updated version with newly discovered facts and many more images is available on the BAHA website.

Outings on Fridays

2009-02-11T15:33:00.001-08:00

Friday, 6 March 2009
10:30 am
Paramount Theatre
Oakland

Timothy Pflueger’s Art Deco masterpiece. Tour will include all the breathtaking public spaces and include a look at the behind-the-scenes workings of the theater. Lunch at a nearby restaurant.

Friday, 3 April 2009
10:15 am
Cathedral of Christ the Light
Oakland

The dramatic glass cathedral, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, stands on the shore of Lake Merritt. It was dedicated last September. Box lunch on the grounds.

Friday, 12 June 2009
11:30 am and 11:45 am
Ardenwood Historic Farm
Fremont

A fully-functioning 1890s farm, preserved in a modern world. Tour includes the restored Patterson House on the grounds. Choose one of two tour times and also take a train ride on the grounds at 10:30 or after the tour. Bring a picnic lunch.

To order tickets, send a check made out to BAHA and a stamped, self-addressed envelope to:
BAHA
Outings on Fridays
P.O. Box 1137
Berkeley, CA 94701

You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify your outing date[s].

Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden

2009-01-28T15:06:00.000-08:00

Kenney Cottage (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Patty Marcks, president of Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden, writes:

The Berkeley Redevelopment Agency is seriously considering a proposal to relocate the historic Kenney Cottage to a city-owned vacant lot at 1631 Fifth Street.

The proposal, of which BAHA is a co-applicant along with Northern California Land Trust (NCLT), also calls for the renovation of the cottage and for a community garden on the site.

Once restored, the cottage would be used for public benefit and activities as yet undetermined. Among the uses proposed are a museum space, art gallery space, space for neighborhood or community gatherings or events, classes, meetings, or office space for a local non-profit organization. It is likely that the cottage would several different uses.

The immediate neighborhood is strongly supportive of this project. The Redevelopment Agency Board (City Council members wearing their other hat) is tentatively scheduled to consider the proposal on 2 June 2009, and perhaps even to vote on it then.

However, it’s been made clear, both by our district City Council member and by the staff of the Redevelopment Agency, that this proposal will have no chance of being approved by the Agency Board unless an organization were to be in place with the capacity to ensure the ongoing viability of the project once it’s been completed. They are concerned about the community garden aspect of the project, as well as operation and maintenance of the cottage and its auxiliary structures (if any).

The City of Berkeley is committed to have nothing further to do with maintaining this property once it’s been transferred to others. It will not provide free water or other free amenities (except for some free compost), as it does with other community gardens in Berkeley. An unfortunate fact, but one we must live with.

This is where the Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden come in. In addition to showing the city that there’s strong neighborhood support for this project, we would demonstrate that a structure and a funding mechanism exist for ensuring the survival of both elements of the project.

Our neighborhood-based members, joined by community experts and supporters, would oversee (or help the new property owner, NCLT oversee) the day-to-day operations of Kenney Cottage & Garden, would employ sufficient persons, whether paid or volunteer, to oversee and manage the garden, to keep the Kenney Cottage clean and maintained, to manage the access to and use of both the cottage and garden facilities, and would raise funds, through a combination of user fees, rental fees for use of the cottage, community donations and grant funding, for the purpose of doing all the aforementioned.

We would love for BAHA members to get on board and support our organization in any way they can. Anyone can be a member of the Friends; all you have to do is e-mail me or call (510) 526-7828.

I invite you to participate in our first fundraising event:

Saturday, 7 Feb. through Tuesday, 10 Feb. 2009
11 am–5 pm (No Early Birds, please)
The Colors of Love
Valentine’s Day Yard Sale
Benefit Fundraiser for Friends of Kenney Cottage Garden
1629 Fifth Street, Berkeley

Last chance to see the Pardee Home

2009-01-20T10:36:00.000-08:00

The historic Pardee Home Museum, residence of George Pardee, governor of California, is closing, and its future is uncertain.

We have scheduled a tour of the house for Thursday, 29 January at 1:00 pm. This is a last chance to participate in a tour led by David Nickolai, who will be leaving for China in February. Meet at 12:45 at 672 11th Street, Oakland. Admission $5.00.

27 January 2009: The BAHA tour is sold out. You can still call call the Pardee Home Museum at (510) 444-2187 to see about tours this Saturday and Sunday.

Thornburgs Storybook Village Succeeded Kelloggs Farm

2009-01-09T09:43:00.000-08:00

Thornburg Village (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Berkeley’s most remarkable collection of storybook-style buildings is Thornburg Village, popularly known as Normandy Village. Developed by Jack W. Thornburg and designed by William Raymond Yelland, it opened in the spring of 1927.

But the story doesn’t end there. Thornburg Village continued to grow over the next three decades in the hands of subsequent owners and architects, and Thornburg went on to a distinguished career in aviation.

The story is told here.

Julia Morgan inducted into the California Hall of Fame

2009-01-08T18:50:00.000-08:00

Architect Julia Morgan was one of twelve people inducted into the California Hall of Fame in 2008. Miss Morgan’s great patrons, the Hearst family, were inducted two years ago.

Conceived by First Lady Maria Shriver, The California Museum’s California Hall of Fame was established in 2006 to honor legendary people who embody California’s innovative spirit and have made their mark on history (see all inductees).

The Landmark Heritage Foundation will celebrate the Miss Morgan’s induction with an event on Sunday, 18 January from 5:00 to 7:30 pm. The celebration will take place at the Berkeley City Club (Julia Morgan, 1929), 2315 Durant Avenue, Berkeley.

A constribution of $25 per person is requested. If you wish to attend, please mail a check payable to:

Landmark Heritage Foundation
2315 Durant Avenue, Suite 306
Berkeley, CA 94704

Reservations will be held at the door. For fuether information, please call (510) 883-9710 or visit berkeleycityclub.com.

Cathy Garrett lectures on cultural landscapes

2008-12-30T13:53:00.000-08:00

The Oakland Heritage Alliance presents Cathy Garrett, principal of PGAdesign Landscape Architects, in a lecture about cultural landscapes.

Thursday, 8 January 2009, at 7:30 pm
Chapel of the Chimes
4499 Piedmont Avenue
Oakland

Admission: OHA members $8; general $10

In Catalina, beauty off the beaten track

2008-12-25T11:35:00.000-08:00

A rainbow over Isthmus Cove, Two Harbors (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2008)

The island of Santa Catalina receives over a million visitors per year, but the vast majority of them go in summer and never set foot outside the principal town of Avalon. Twenty-one miles long and eight miles wide at its widest point, the island offers much more than day-tripper cotton candy and kitschy souvenirs. And if you go in winter, the place is all yours—especially if you choose to stay on the western and less frequented side of Catalina, where a half-mile isthmus separates two natural and scenic back-to-back harbors.

Read the complete article here.

Measure LL defeated at the polls

2008-11-06T12:05:00.000-08:00

Measure LL, which would have replaced Berkeley’s 1974 Landmarks Preservation Ordinance with a developer-friendly version, went down to deafeat in the 4 Nov. 2008 election with a 56.76% majority.

BAHA thanks all Berkeleyans who voted NO on LL.

Landmarks Preservation Ordinance: taking stock of 34 years

2008-10-31T15:21:00.000-07:00

One of the two threatened Warren Cheney houses on the U.C. campus (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2006)

How did Berkeley’s Landmarks Preservation Ordinance come about? What did it do for Berkeley? The article Landmarks Preservation Ordinance: taking stock of 34 years examines the history of preservation in Berkeley and the city’s successes and failures in saving historic resources.

Greening Your Historic Building

2008-10-21T17:00:00.000-07:00

Heywood Apartments, 2119 Addison St. (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2008)

Thursday, 6 November 2008, 7:00 pm
North Berkeley Senior Center
1901 Hearst Avenue, Main Room

Come learn about the City of Berkeley’s efforts in green building and how green building methods can be applied to your historic building. Join the City of Berkeley and the Landmarks Preservation Commission for this discussion. Presentations by Billi Romain, City Sustainability Coordinator and Thomas Dufurrena, Principal at Page & Turnbull and expert in preservation and sustainable design. RSVP (510) 981-7488.

A corrected history of the Heywood family

2008-10-02T11:47:00.000-07:00

Charles W. Heywood House, 1808 Fifth Street (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2008)

Legendary Berkeley pioneer Zimri Brewer Heywood and his many sons, who included two Berkeley mayors and a California Assembly member, have accumulated a comet-like tail of stories and quasi-histories, repeated long enough to be taken for fact.

A new fortnightly series of articles on the Heywoods, published in the Berkeley Daily Planet and on the BAHA website, reconstructs the Heywood family’s history from original documents and newspaper reports, setting the record straight on what actually happened, and when.

Three articles have been published so far:

Zimri Brewer Heywood: Separating Fact From Myth

On the Trail of Zimri Brewer Heywood’s Residence

Will the Real William Heywood Stand Up?

More will follow.

BAHA fall lectures

2008-09-22T17:46:00.000-07:00

All lectures begin at 7:30 pm and are held at the
Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street
Berkeley, CA 94709

Ocean View Historic District (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Thursday, 16 October 2008
Preservation Works!
Free event!
How the Berkeley community was able to save architectural and cultural treasures, and what we need to do to ensure that we will be able to save others in the future. Panelists for this illustrated talk include Susan Cerny, Stephanie Manning, Arlene Silk, Marie Bowman, and others. Donations to No on Measure LL will be gratefully accepted.

Alameda County Courthouse before and after the 1868 Earthquake
(photos courtesy of San Leandro Public Library & the Bancroft Library, U.C. via USGS)

Thursday, 30 October 2008
Richard Schwartz: East Bay Stories of the 1868 Hayward Fault Earthquake
21 October 2008 marks the 140th anniversary of the last “Big One” on the Hayward Fault, one of the most destructive in California history. USGS scientists describe this fault as a tectonic time bomb, due anytime for another magnitude 6.8-to-7.0 earthquake. Historian Richard Schwartz’s lecture will include first-hand accounts by people who experienced the shock, little-known facts about the quake, what the people learned from the quake, and a survey of buildings that survived the 1868 earthquake and are still standing. Tickets $15

Thursday, 13 November 2008
Hannah Sigur: The Influence of Japanese Art on Design
An illuminating examination of Japanese art and America’s journey to modern architecture and design in the Gilded Age, from the Centennial of 1876 through the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904. Tickets $15

To order tickets, send a check made out to BAHA and a stamped, self-addressed envelope to:
BAHA
Fall Lectures
P.O. Box 1137
Berkeley, CA 94701

You can also pay for tickets by credit card via PayPal. Please specify lectures date[s] and number of tickets in the Description field.

The end for Memorial Grove

2008-09-05T17:07:00.000-07:00

Photo: Daniella Thompon, 5 September 2008

Preservation news around town

2008-09-02T12:02:00.001-07:00

A view of Grizzly Peak from Canyon Road in Strawberry Canyon
(postcard published by Edward H. Mitchell c. 1905)

From the Summer 2008 edition of the BAHA Newsletter:

Strawberry Canyon

The scenic vista of Strawberry Canyon, a swath of green open space, is threatened by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s 20 year plan to further develop its hillside location. The proposed construction of nearly one million gross square feet of new buildings in both Strawberry Canyon and Blackberry canyons includes the recently announced 140,000-gsf Helios Energy Research Facility and a 50-car parking lot planned for undeveloped land within Strawberry Canyon. Instead of using the existing Blackberry Gate entrance at the top of Hearst Avenue, an additional entry road would be built from centennial Drive in Strawberry Canyon These planned encroachments threaten the historical balance between research and development activities in the Berkeley hills and less intense activities with smaller footprints.

Strawberry Canyon should be designated a Cultural Landscape for its historical connections to (among other events) Frederic Law Olmsted’s writings about the canyon and his vision of residential life in Berkeley; the headwaters and the system of engineered water resources during the University’s early years; the tradition of tree plantations in memory of University luminaries (e.g., the groves dedicated to Stephen Mather and Woodbridge Metcalf); the University Botanical Garden; the development of the East Bay Regional Park District; and the creation of the University’s Ecological Study Area. Earlier generations expressed their aesthetic, social, recreation, biological, and academic values in the canyon, which live on today in this culturally significant landscape.

Memorial Stadium oak grove (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2007)

Oak Grove

Speculation about Native American burial grounds and memorials to World War I soldiers aside, the oak grove west of Memorial Stadium is a contributing feature in the stadium’s landmark designation (listed in the National Register of Historic Places, 2006). The application submitted by BAHA includes two basic resources: the stadium itself and its site (including the rock walls and the grove). The stadium’s original “oak grove” landscaping visually connects the site to such pre-development landscape features still found in Strawberry Canyon as the oak-bay woodland on the north-facing slope and the riparian ecosystem of Strawberry Creek. The oaks also gracefully screen residential Piedmont Avenue, designed by Frederic Law Olmsted, from the massive stadium structure.

The proposed North Shattuck Safeway

Safeway

Safeway’s proposal to replace their vintage supermarkets with larger “lifestyle stores” has been in the news. This will be the second “makeover” for the venerable local retailer, the first being the replacement of their small 1930s stores, beginning in the 1950s, with the present low, suburban-style supermarkets, designed by none other than the firm of Wurster, Bernardi & Emmons (see image). Berkeley’s lone Safeway store, 1400 Shattuck Avenue, with its expanse of glass, curved front gable, and blue mosaic tile, was built in 1965 and will be affected by the new plan. Now that you know that the building is the work of a major Bay Area architect, you may want to give it a second, more critical look.

Armstrong College (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2004)

Armstrong College

Berkeley’s Judah L. Magnes Museum, owner of the downtown Armstrong College Building (Walter H. Ratcliff, Jr., 1926, Landmark #184), 2222 Harold Way, recently presented renovation plans to the Landmarks Preservation Commission. This will be the new home of the museum, now located at 2911 Russell Street. Plans call for the removal of Ratcliff’s distinctive front door, a change that is under the LPC’s purview, and which was approved at the 10 July meeting. Also indicated on the plans is the almost complete removal of the interior (except for the second floor auditorium). This major loss of historic fabric is not subject to LPC review, as interiors of privately owned structures are not protected by landmark designation.

BAHA News

BAHA Preservation Awards call for entries

February 2012 Fireside Lectures

2012 California Preservation Conference

BAHA’s Holiday Open House

Letter to the owners of the Sequoia Apartments

Color, by Karl Kardel

Members’ reception at the Harris House

The Lueders House is Tom Roe’s masterpiece

In branch libraries settlement, losers outnumber winners

Thousand Oaks urn dedication ceremony

Fall 2011 Lecture Series

Alameda Legacy Home Tour

What’s Out There Weekend

AIA East Bay Home Tours 2011

2011 Preservation Awards Winners

Fall lecture series to be announced

Two authors sign books

Oakland Heritage Alliance summer walking tours

2011 House Tour Photo Gallery

Annual Membership Meeting & Preservation Awards Presentation

In-person House Tour ticket sales

House tour volunteers needed

Historic Branch Libraries could be saved

Laurie Bright Memorial

Pre-House Tour Lecture

Our 2011 Spring House Tour

Alternatives to Branch Libraries demolitions

Outings on Fridays

AIA East Bay Endangered Buildings List

Imaginarium: Drawings by Bernard Maybeck

Preservation Awards call for entries

Fireside Lectures sold out

February Fireside Lectures

Robert Judson Clark

BAHA’s Holiday Open House

More developers finance the Yes on R campaign

Ten excellent reasons to Vote No on R

“Sierra Club” Yes on R mailer financed by Sam Zell

Garden Party to Benefit the McCreary-Greer House Maintenance Fund

City Council candidates respond to BAHA’s questions

Vote NO on Measure R

Click here to download and print the flier.

Measure R  Claims vs. Facts

Fall Downtown Walking Tours

Look for us at the Solano Stroll

Public library demolitions

2010 Preservation Awards Winners

Chase Community Giving on Facebook

Two Frank Lloyd Wright events

New Outing on Friday added

House Tour photo gallery

The Goddards and Julia Morgan

April walking & driving tours in Berkeley

Cheney House reduced to rubble

In the matter of 2707 Rose Street

Two pre-House Tour lectures

On Photoplayers and bakeries in West Berkeley

Our 2010 House Tour: Looking at Julia Morgan

Outings on Fridays

“Designing with Nature” film premiere

Laurie Vern Bright, 1942–2010

Original windows matter. Don’t replace, repair!

Kenneth Harvey Cardwell, 1920–2010

Berkeley Iceland nominated to the National Register

El Cerrito’s Architectural Heritage

Save the (Berkeley Daily) Planet

Our holiday open house

BAHA Open House

41 Berkeley Walking Tours

Kenney Cottage Community Garden Groundbreaking

BAHA Fall Walking Tours

Preservation at Work :: Fall Lecture Series

First Church of Christ, Scientist Centennial Lecture

Learn how to fix double-hung windows

The carpenter, the baker, and the Classics professor

Beltane Ranch: From ‘Dusty Place’ to ‘Mammy’s Place’

In Glen Ellen, a Pig Palace, a Wolf House, and other wonders

BAHA 2009 Preservation Awards

Rustic Traditions in Southern California’s Mountain Resorts

Measure R Claims vs. Facts

Thornburgs Storybook Village Succeeded Kelloggs Farm