Architectural Styles of the San Francisco East Bay

Spanish and Mexican Era: 1776-1848

Spanish Colonial Styles, c. 1790s-1850s

The style is thick adobe walls, latticed windows, and post-and-beam construction on overhanging rooflines. Example below: Martinez Adobe on the John Muir Estate, Martinez.

Victorian Era: 1837-1901

Greek Revival, c. 1840s-1860s

These buildings share the basic characteristic of a front resembling a Greek temple, with a triangular, pedimented roofline and columns or pillars across the facade. Example below: Old State Capitol of Benicia.

Gothic Revival, c. 1840s-around 1900

The first truly Victorian style, the main features are pointed, arched windows and/or doors; high-peaked gables; lacy trim in the form of bargeboards on the edges of gables, and tracery carving over doors and windows. Example below: Mosswood Cottage in Oakland.

False-Front “Pioneer” House, c. 1860-around 1890

Early-Victorian wood-frame houses, with a rectangular, flat extension of the facade above the roofline. The term “Pioneer box” refers to houses that lack the false front and usually have a pedimented or hipped roof. The decorative trim on these houses consist of hoods or “shelf moulding” above the doors and windows and often, of brackets along the cornice line below the false front. Example below: Berkeley’s Oceanview neighborhood on 5th Street.

Bracketed Italianate House, c. 1865-1890

One of the most popular and numerous of all the Victorian styles, these homes borrowed Italian Rennaisance motifs — tall, narrow, round-arched windows; columned porticos; low-hipped roofs; and quoins at the corner. They are made of wood, with double-curved brackets on the cornice and angled or slanted bay windows. Example below: Anthony House in Alameda.

Raised-Basement Cottage, c. 1865-around 1885

Similar to Pioneer houses, these homes have Italianate-style trim, triangular pediments in the roofline, and raised basements. Less ornate versions are often called “workingman’s cottages.” Example below: Dana and Parker streets in Berkeley.

Italianate Villa, c. 1860-around 1885

These large, often mansion-sized homes have a square tower or cupola above the roofline. They usually have triangular pediments on the roofline and/or porch and very ornately decorated porticos, as well as quoining at the corners. Example below: The Pardee Mansion in Oakland.

Stick Style, c. 1870-around 1895

Stick-style houses have a squared, vertical structure with strips of wood planking along the corners and above the windows and doorways (stickwork). The bay windows and tall porticos are squared and boxy, and brackets are usually at 90-degree angles. Example below: 750 Pacific Avenue, Alameda.

Stick-Eastlake Villa, c. 1875-around 1895

Imposing square-towered houses combine stickwork trim and vertical lines with Eastlake decorative motifs (borrowed from English designer, Charles Eastlake): carved or incised floral panels, machine-cut geometric friezes, and sunburst panels. Stained-glass windows are common. Sticklake houses and cottages are smaller and have no tower. Example: Durant Avenue in Berkeley. (Photo to be added.)

Queen Anne Style, c. 1880-1900

The Victorian Era’s last and most ornate style, they combine numerous motifs from earlier Victorian styles, such as bargeboards along high-peaked gables, stickwork, sunburst panels, stained-glass windows. Also, cut-out floral panels with elements such as spindles on the porch, fishscale shingles, “scenic” stained-glass windows, and recessed corner bays. The Queen Anne cottage has most of these features but no tower. The “towered villa” has rounded corner towers topped by spires, most commonly in a “witches hat” shape. Example below: Boudrow House in Berkeley.

Transitional Era: c. 1890-1915

Romanesque Revival, c. 1886-around 1915

Taken from the heavy stone structures of medieval Europe, this style was used primarily for churches and commercial buildings. The walls are thick stone or red brick; the rounded arches have concentric ridges or rims around their outer edges. Churches in this style have squared and/or rounded corner towers, semicircular apses set into their walls, and large stained-glass windows. Example below: Christian Science Church, 17th and Franklin streets, Oakland.

Colonial Revival House, c. 1895-1915

A loose adaptation of various Early American styles and motifs. The most popular form was the boxy, hipped-roof Colonial Revival house, generally decorated with Palladian windows; pilasters at the corners; clapboarding and/or shingling on the facade; leaded- and/or stained -glass windows; and columned porticos, often topped with balustrades. Example below: McCreary House on Durant Avenue in Berkeley.

High-Peaked Colonial Revival House, c. 1895-1915

This transitional form of the Colonial Revival, has a steeply pitched main gable; slanting dormers on the sides; small corner porticos; balustraded or Palladian windows in the gable; and shingling on the upper surfaces and clapboarding on the lower ones. Example below: Bonita Street, Berkeley.

Craftsman Bungalow, c. 1890-around 1920

Modest-sized houses (bungalow refers to a one- or a one-and-a-half-story house), have a rustic, woodcrafted look that comes from their use of natural materials. They generally have roofs sloping towards the street, a dormer window in the middle; exposed beaming along the eaves; brown-shingled walls; and wood, stone or brick pillars along the front porch. Example below: at Milvia and Cedar streets, Berkeley.

Beaux Arts Neo-Classic, c. 1890-around 1925

From the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, this school of architecture used neo-Classic Renaissance motifs, usually on large public buildings. The facades have receding wings (alternating planes), and are decorated with allegorical or symbolic sculptures and sometimes inscriptions. Example below: John Galen Howard’s Hearst Mining Building on the UC Berkeley campus.

Period Revival Era: 1900-around 1940

Mission Revival Styles, c. 1900-1940

Several historic styles were adapted from the various Mediterranean cultures, including Italian, Spanish, and Spanish Colonial styles. Mediterranean styles were often used on bungalows, and the major characteristics are pastel-colored stucco walls, round-arched windows and/or doors, and red clay-tile roofs. One of the most popular Mediterranean revival styles in California was the Mission Revival, using mock bell towers, curved espanada gables, exposed rafter beams (vigas), and usually an arcade along one or more sides. Example below: the old Southern Pacific Railroad Depot, Berkeley.

Tudor Revival Style, c. 1910-1940

The most popular Period Revival style for well-to-do home builders, Tudor Revival was borrowed from 16th-century house designs. The prominent features are high-peaked gables and half-timbered facades, leaded-glass windows, bargeboards, and brick facing. Example below: 35 Parkside Avenue, Berkeley.

Georgian Revival Style, c. 1910-around 1940

These buildings essentially copied the American Georgian Colonial style. They have either gambrel (double-angled) or high-peaked gables, latticed windows with shutters, dormers in the roof, and pedimented porticos in front of the entryway. Lintels above windows and Palladian doorways and/or windows were sometimes used. Example below: Julia Morgan’s at 1 Eucalyptus Road, Berkeley.

Early Modern Era: 1906-1950

Prairie Style, c. 1906-around 1930

This style was derived from an early prototype design that Frank Lloyd Wright published in 1906. It is distinguished by its plain, rectangular surfaces, horizontal overall lines, and flat or low-pitched roofs with wide, extending eaves. The facades of these houses are stucco, and simple geometric stucco patterns were set within the chimney and/or porch and rectangular panels in the window panes, and often in panels set between the windows. Example below: John Hudson Thomas’ Loring House, Spruce Street, Berkeley.

Art Deco and Streamlined Moderne Styles, c. 1925-1950

The Moderne structure was designed to suggest the new, “clean” design of a technical 20th-century society, with a heavy dose of the exotic. In the Art Deco or ZigZag Moderne style, the entry was usually ornate, and the facade, with its projecting vertical slabs, was decorated in Egyptian, Babylonian, Aztec, Islamic, and/or Hindu motifs. The Streamlined Moderne was “cleaned up” Art Deco — curved edges, and across the facade, straight horizontal lines and the use of modern industrial materials: reinforced concrete, glass bricks, aluminum. Example below: The Alameda Theater, designed by Pfleuger and Miller, in Alameda.