REMUDDLING
opinion...

Hill Street may have to be renamed Remuddling Row, if the house in the middle doesn't spark a restoration trend.

# Hill Street Blues

These three houses (above), located on Hill Street in San Francisco, were reportedly all constructed by the same builder sometime around 1890. One hundred years later, they look like houses from three different cities, inexplicably lined up together on the same street.

The house on the right still bears a family resemblance, even after having been trimmed of its trim and (mis)treated to some substitute siding. But the stuccoed house (detail, right) has lost virtually everything: trim, siding, fenestration — and character. The beautifully maintained Victorian standing between them (detail, far right) is either a proud survivor or a desperate hold-out, depending on one's point of view. But however one regards it, that house has become a stranger on its own street, squeezed by the remuddlings of its neighbors.

Thanks to David Johnson for submitting the photos.

*Slap on enough stucco, and the most handsome of Victorian row houses (far right) can look like an anonymous box (right).*

80

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1991

REMUDDLING

opinion...

# Hill Street Blues

80

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1991