My dad often asks me, “did you enjoy your childhood?” When my family first moved to San Francisco in 2000, my parents knew very little about the city and let a realtor, who couldn’t care less about our best interests, decide the neighborhood we’d settle in, which ultimately determined which schools I went to, the friends I made, the businesses we frequented. Having once again gone through the process since then of looking for and moving to a new house, my dad often expresses his frustration with that first realtor because apparently, she had hardly shown them the city’s single-family residential areas, which were much cheaper at the time and would’ve made a greater return on investment than the Twin Peaks condo we ended up buying.
But I wouldn’t trade the 14 years I spent in that neighborhood for the world. I developed my affinity for deriving and urban hiking then because we were located at the intersection of, what I would argue are, San Francisco’s most interesting neighborhoods. There was Forest Knolls and Forest Hills to the West, Haight Ashbury and Cole Valley to the North, the Castro and Noe Valley to the East, and Diamond Heights and Glen Park to the South. All within walking distance. Amazing views, hidden staircases, a range of architectural aesthetics, our 1983 condo had a birdcage elevator and a bar! The higher up on the hill, the more impressive and imposing the houses; I spent many walks with my dog and iPod Video admiring a particular home just a couple blocks away from my own.
There’s something very special about the architecture in this area (as a kid/teen, I couldn’t put my finger on it but later discovered @moderndiamondheights, which captures its characteristics perfectly.) Maybe because of the way we were situated on the hill, with bright blue sky ahead of us and rolling fog behind us, many residences had skylights and greenrooms to make the most of the temperamental access to sunlight. But the building on the corner of Hopkins and Burnett was different. While the other homes had a sea ranch-esque preference for wood and earthy-elements, this one was all white, somewhat sterile looking from the outside, and didn’t look lived in. But nonetheless, something about it just makes you want to stop and stare.
The circumstance under which I finally discovered its significance was…unfortunate. 49 Hopkins Ave is actually Richard Neutra’s Largent House and in 2018, it was illegally razed by a selfish developer who purchased the property for $1.7M the year prior. Despite being the first of 5 houses Neutra designed in the Bay Area, there isn’t a lot of information about it and if you do attempt to Google search, I suggest you filter for results pre-demolition.
Commissioned in 1935 by Lydia Fuller Largent, an artist and public school teacher, “his approach to design was extremely client-focused, producing his unique and masterful homes that reflect both his own vision married to the direct needs and desires of his client and to the natural environment of the site.” The Largent House was built for a different era of functionality and modesty of its first owners. It was designed to fit the narrow Twin Peaks hillside and “combined older memories of clapboarded, vertically attenuated Victorian San Francisco with typically Neutra fenestration and detailing.” The house was sold to H. R. Stegman in 1962, musician Steve Gungl in 1972, Robert Sorenson in 1982, Derrik Anderson and Wayne Edfors II in 2004, Goldberg LLC in 2013, and fatally to Ross Johnston in 2017.
The city's planning board approved a permit to remodel the house with the caveat of preserving the majority of the first floor. When concerned neighbors alerted the city that nothing was left of the historic home, the case made its way to court, where it was demanded that the house be rebuilt to its original footprint and massing, and to use the same materials that were used in the initial building. But retroactive justification for illegally tearing down everything but the garage and exterior frame, alleged that the house had little historic value left and was structurally unsound. The defending attorney suggested that the house had first been erased in a 1969 fire and remodels in the 1970s and 1980s, which included the addition of an indoor swimming pool.
The public’s reaction to the city’s verdict was mixed. Some advocated for harsher punishment and others close to the architect suggested that if he were alive today, he would disapprove of the ‘Disneyesque’ imitation (part of the agreement included installing a sidewalk plaque.) “To rebuild this house, designed specifically for the Largents over 80 years ago, to represent a current political issue hardly seems like something Neutra would endorse.” The case was appealed in 2019 and the city lost its case, but regardless of the outcome, the loss at 49 Hopkins is irreversible. All that we can do to preserve its history is continue to share stories and pictures of the magnificent, stark white house.
