Mansions and Victorians in Pacific Heights-SF Tour-Alta Plaza Pk to Lafayette Pk

Being one of the holiday weekends of summer 2025 and in celebration of the beautiful early summer we're experiencing in the Bay Area I've planned a little something extra today. We'll dive in a little deeper for the best of both the Mansions and Victorians today.

We meet on the sidewalk at the intersection of Jackson St. & Pierce St., SF, next to the north-side of Alta Plaza Park.

A new addition is including some local tales of "urban gossip" and legend.

There is available free parking around the neighborhood and no restriction on weekends. (There is always parking on the very steep streets and usually around Alta Plaza Park for example.) To find a spot quickly look on the steep hilly street of Pierce between Jackson & Pacific Ave, 90 degree parking on the west side of the street here.

The tour is a little longer than in the past with some new additions as we make our way from the far west side of the tour at Vallejo & Normandie to Lafayette Park to the east and return to where we started. (Unless lunch intervenes as we cross Fillmore on the return.)
After the tour visit Fillmore St. where there are lots of shops, restaurants, coffee houses, bars and bakeries..
You're welcome to join me for lunch. My go to places are La Mediterranee or Janes across the street at Fillmore & Sacramento St. Or Dynasty Dumpling over at Calif.& Divisadero. If we go there we have to stop afterwards across the street at B Patisserie for coffee and desert.

About midway through the tour we'll stop for a break atop Lafayette Park. The strange 19th century tale of Samuel Holladay and how he got away with building his mansion on the highest point in Pacific Hts., even though his residential real estate "empire", was atop and within Lafayette Park. This true tale will be told with some of the old photos.
They'll be restrooms at the Park and views and we'll describe the surrounding heritage Victorian houses as time allows but making our way back through some of the best examples of remaining Victorians in SF.

Pacific Heights is best known for being one of the most affluent neighborhoods in San Francisco. This tour highlights the architecture, and some of the people who built, occupied and maintained these grand properties. About 30 of which will be on our tour with a few sentences of information about each property.

The walking tour is 3.5-4.0 miles. With the usual SF hills. I'll be making a memento, video slideshow, using the app, "Relive", everyone gets a link

Looking at a San Francisco Victorian, what to look for:
(There are five Styles)

1. Flat front Italianate- (earliest Victorians).
2. Italianate with slanted bay windows.
3. San Francisco Stick Style (also called East Lake). Simpler square bay windows now used. Overall more elaborate decoration.
4. Queen Anne Tower House&Witches Cap, with angled or rounded bay windows & front gable
5. Queen Anne Row House"Cottage", 1, 1-1/2 or two stories. Large front gable. Possible moon-gate entry.

• Features & "Gingerbread"
• Floral Decor-Garlands (one of many types of decorations known as *"Gingerbread")
• Fish scale&Diamond shingles-
• Towers & Witch's Cap-
• Stained Glass or Beveled Glass-
• Carvings of grotesque faces-
• Sunbursts- often painted gold color, half or full.
• Gables (Queen Anne's) in a variety of material- (mainly redwood)
• Newel Posts and Finials on Tower tops and roof peaks-

We'll see clusters of Victorian homes systematically built for the average working person by a development company, "The Real Estate Assoc." THEA, in business from 1870 to 1880. Not quite magnificent but many still standing.

Periods
1860 - 1870s Italianate: Buildings were vertical in emphasis with rounded classical detail. Earliest had flat windows, with false roof fronts.
1880s Stick Style (also called East Lake): Squared off bay windows appear.
Late 1880s and 1890s Queen Anne : Gingerbread would be applied to both the Stick and Queen Ann styles in San Francisco. Sloping roofs appear. With gables and towers.
Rooflines in the Queen Anne were irregular, combining the witches hat rooftop on a rounded or octagonal tower.
Following the Victorians the next major architectural style were the Period Revival residences popular in the 1920s and 1930s.
If you would like a scholarly and detailed explanation with photos, click.