Musings on Art Deco and Modernism in the San Francisco Bay Area
The story of the unbuilt magical social club that exists only on paper is typical of the 1920s: it involved oceanfront real estate, a private club seeking out the well-to-do and nouveau riche, beauty queens, suspect business machinations, a grand jury investigation, and an ultimate lack of funds for the oversized ambitions of everyone involved.
Many San Franciscans remember the elegant department store that once graced the corner of Stockton and Geary streets, I. Magnin & Co. Like the City of Paris, once across Stockton Street, Ransohoff's a few blocks away, and many other long-gone stores, these beautifully designed and lushly appointed stores evoke memories of a by-gone era when… Continue reading Former I. Magnin ladies room looking good again
San Francisco's iconic Golden Gate Bridge will celebrate its 75th year in service next month. Big festivities are planned all over the city, including a "spectacular event" organized by the bridge authority for May 27 at Crissy Field. A special website has all the details for the upcoming Golden Gate Festival. This year, there will be no… Continue reading Golden Gate Bridge exhibit shows surprising influences
Rain has finally descended upon a parched San Francisco, casting a perfect gloomy backdrop just in time for this year's Noir City Film Festival. Aficionados of the dark film genre are looking forward to this year's program, where San Francisco plays a role in some of the films, starting tonight at the Castro Theatre. Both familiar and long-gone buildings and… Continue reading Streamline Moderne gem a quiet star in “Dark Passage” at Noir City Film Festival
The El Rey Theatre, the former movie palace that still towers over Ocean Avenue and parts of Ingleside Terraces, is turning 80 next month. To celebrate the anniversary, the Voice of Pentecost, which bought the building in 1977, is hosting a fund-raiser, and the organizers will be showing the same film that was featured during… Continue reading The El Rey Theatre to come back as a movie palace for a night
Cole Porter please forgive me for messing up your lyrics, but last month I had a kind of late 1920s, early 1930s week in New York. After seeing the Broadway revival of "Anything Goes," I still can't get Porter's witty lyrics out of my head. And they meld so well with many of the city's glorious… Continue reading It’s de-lightful, it’s de-lovely, it’s Deco in New York
The Roaring 1920s in America were happy-go-lucky days of wild times, illegal speakeasies and dances like the Jitterbug and the Charleston. But fueling all that crazy joy was a stock market bubble that ended, as we know now, in the Great Depression. But before the market crash of 1929, most U.S. cities were seeing a huge… Continue reading Magnificent Deco apartment houses live on in SF
Architectural historians are like detectives, sleuthing to figure out what happened at the scene of a crime. They use old photos, blueprints, layers of paint and other materials beneath the surface of remodeled historic buildings, looking for clues of the original architect's intent. They also try and determine what travesties occurred in the name of modernization. So a recent discovery of… Continue reading El Rey Theatre blueprints show what’s missing
Miller & Pflueger's innovative skyscraper 450 Sutter was named to the National Register of Historic Places, as of last month. The stunning Mayan themed 26-story high rise building, completed in 1929, was described in the application as a "masterwork" of noted San Francisco architect, Timothy Pflueger. The listing is on the National Parks Service Web site here.… Continue reading 450 Sutter named to National Register of Historic Places
Timothy Pflueger Blog 