California’s History of Residential Design Innovation UCB

California’s History of Residential Design Innovation UCB OLLI Spring 2021 Syllabus

Dr. Linda L. Day

Each lecture is a gallery of images that tell the story of California’s housing innovation.

Week 1 Adobes, Cottages, Bungalows

Peralta Adobe Interior, 1797 Perkins Cabin, 1849

Geography, climate, and culture influenced the Spanish/Mexican adobe building traditions and

those of the Americans and Europeans who used coastal forests and wood frame building

traditions who followed them in colonizing California. Wood frame workers’ cottages and

bungalows reflected and influenced American home building.

Suggested Reading and Viewing for Session 1

Kirker, Harold, California’s Architectural Frontier: Style and Tradition in the 19th

Century, NY: Russell & Russell, 1960.

McCoy, Esther, Five California Architects, NY: Praeger, 1975.

Winter, Robert, The California Bungalow, LA: Hennessey & Ingalls, Inc., 1980.

Restoring Presidio Adobe Walls. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLgbzNGuHrs

Buster Keaton’s “One Week” from 1920 depicts his attempt to assemble a mail order bungalow.

https://www.jamescolincampbell.com/california-bungalows/

California’s History of Residential Design Innovation Syllabus UCB OLLI Spring 2021

Dr. Linda L. Day

2

Week 2 Victorians

From the Gothic Revival homes and Italianate flat fronts inspired by pattern book author, A.J.

Downing to the slanted bays and richly embellished Queen Annes made possible by machine

woodworking, Victorian homes were built of wood from California’s coastal forests of oak and

redwood and benefitted from design/technology competence. Examples are the elegant, well-

built homes in affluent neighborhoods that were connected to city water and sewer systems by

the end of the 19th century and were the first “modern” houses.

Suggested Resources for Session 2

Delehanty, Randolph, with Sexton, Richard, photographer, In the Victorian Style, SF:

Chronicle Books, 1991.

Taylor, David, “Victorian Houses, A Guide To The Major Architectural Styles”

http://faculty.wcas.northwestern.edu/~infocom/scndempr/school.html

Walker, Richard, “Victorian Order and the Look of Urbanity”

http://www.foundsf.org/index.php?title=Victorian_Order_and_the_Look_of_Urbanity


Dr. Linda L. Day

3

Week 3 The First Bay Region Tradition in Architecture

Rev. Joseph Worcester’s Piedmont Cottage, 1876 (William Keith painting 1783)

Young architects with Beaux Arts and Eastern U.S. training inspired Northern California

architects to create a regional expression of international building trends that emphasized

integration of indoor and outdoor spaces. Bernard Maybeck, Julia Morgan, Willis Polk, and

others expressed historic details derived from classical and medieval buildings with wood and

sensitivity to a wondrous climate and landscape.


Freudenheim, L. M. and Sussman, E., Building with Nature: Roots of the San Francisco

Bay Region Tradition, Santa Barbara: Peregrine Smith, Inc., 1974.

Longstreth, Richard, On the Edge of the world: Four Architects in San Francisco at the

Turn of the Century, Berkeley: UC Press, 1983

Winter, Robert, ed., Toward a Simpler Way of Life: The Arts and Crafts Architects of

California, Berkeley: UC Press, 1997.

Making Roof Shingles With Hand Tools https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZA1J8RHltY


Dr. Linda L. Day

4

Week 4 Classical Revival, Storybook Houses, and the Community Builders

Normandy (nee Thornburg) Village, 1927

By the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, classical revival styles as showcased by East Coast

architects were in demand by Californians. When members of the Armed Forces returned home

from the battlefields of Europe, they brought ideas about Tudor and Norman buildings with

them. Community builders took advantage of expanding streetcar lines to develop greenfield

acreage with period style homes.


Thompson, Daniella, “Thornburg Village (Normandy Village),” Berkeley Architectural

Heritage Association, http://berkeleyheritage.com/berkeley_landmarks/thornburg.html

Weiss Marc A., The Rise of the Community Builders: The American Real Estate Industry

and Urban Land Planning, (Columbia History of Urban Life.) New York: Columbia University

Press. 1987.

Hollywood’s Architect: PBS SoCal | KCET Documentary.

https://www.pbs.org/video/hollywoods-architect-3prwsa/


Dr. Linda L. Day

5

Week 5 The Second Bay Tradition

William Wurster, founder and dean of the UC Berkeley College of Architecture and

Environmental Design, led a talented group of architects in a “redwood post and beam” approach

to building. Houses by him and a talented group including John Cooper Funk, Gardner A.

Dailey, and Henry Hill are showcased.

Suggested Reading for Session 5

Woodbridge, Sally, ed., Bay Area Houses, Salt Lake City: Peregrine Smith, 1988.

Week 6 Ranch Houses

William Wurster’s Gregory Farm House, shown here in his drawing, told the world that

California ranch houses were special. This lecture starts with the adobe and wood frame ranchos

and haciendas, shows how adobe and early California wood frame buildings remained an

influence on regionally expressive architecture, and shows how the California ranch house and

the work of Cliff May and Joseph Eichler influenced the nation’s home building industry.


Brostrom, C. L and Peters, R.C., The Houses of William Wurster: Frames for Living,

NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2011.

Gibbs, J. and Olsberg, N., Carefree California: Cliff May and the Romance of the Ranch

House, NY: Rizzoli, 2012


Dr. Linda L. Day

6

Week 7 Tract Houses

Master contractors used industrial construction to develop greenfields for Bay Area subdivisions

with thousands of houses and with parks, schools, churches, and shopping centers to support

expanding suburbans. We explore Bohannon’s San Lorenzo Village and Hillsdale, Meyer’s

Glenmoor Gardens, and Cliff May’s Lakewood Rancho Estates, ending with Bay Meadows, a

San Mateo Transit Oriented Development.

Suggested Reading Session 7

Weiss, M. A., The Rise of the Community Builders: The American Real Estate Industry

and Urban Land Planning, N Y: Columbia University Press, 1987.

Week 8 Modernism and the Third Bay Tradition

Sea Ranch Condo 1, 1963

Modernism in the Bay Area was a regional interpretation of the International Style that

originated in Europe. The use of steel, glass, concrete, flat roofs, glass curtain walls, and

cantilevers was joined by sensitivity to climate, landscape, and the use of wood.


Hess, Alan, (Author), Alan Weintraub (Photographer), Forgotten Modern: California

Houses 1940-1970, Gibbs Smith, 2007.

Documents

California’s History of Residential Design Innovation UCB