Saint Francis Wood

What is it about the ideal neighborhood that makes everyone content? The pleasant arrangement of the houses? The design of the homes? Clean streets and sidewalks, bordered by well-tended trees and flowers and patches of greenery? Or is it the neighbors themselves, who go about their daily lives being generally pleasant and polite, helping out when asked but disappearing into their own lives when privacy is called for? A poll taken in 1998 for the San Francisco Examiner reported that residents of St. Francis Wood were the among the city’s most satisfied. All things being equal over the last dozen years, there’s no reason to believe they still aren’t: Their neighborhood is a model of tranquility and natural beauty and residential splendor unlike any other in San Francisco.

Born of the City Beautiful movement from the late-19th and early-20th centuries, St. Francis Wood retains to a great degree its distinction as one of the nation’s finest “residence parks.” Planned by the ambitious developer Duncan McDuffie a few years after the quake and fire of 1906, it occupies 175 acres on the western flank of Mount Davidson. Its contoured street plan (devised by the renowned Olmsted Brothers, sons of Frederick Law Olmsted, whose masterpiece was New York’s Central Park) features a grand St. Francis Boulevard running down the middle, with a Roman Beaux-Arts entryway at Junipero Serra Boulevard, a circular fountain midway, and a terraced plaza and fountain at its end.

Of the more than 600 architect-designed homes on larger-than-average lots, many are superior examples of Italian Renaissance revival style favored in the first decades of the 20th century. (Over the years, other styles slipped in, including French Renaissance, Spanish-Moorish eclectic, Tudor, and English cottage.) The Italian theme was also chosen to reinforce the link to the birthplace of the city’s namesake, St. Francis of Assisi, who was invoked for this development as well. All home plans had to be approved by the supervising architect for St. Francis Wood, the famed architect Henry Gutterson (himself a follower of Bernard Maybeck)—all in order to achieve the aesthetic balance McDuffie envisioned, which included a minimum required setback from the street, harmonious color schemes, even mandated fence heights and landscaping. Gutterson is credited with designing more than 80 of the homes, many of which stand, unaltered, today.

Because McDuffie was so insistent on his vision, and Gutterson so adept at maintaining it through the decades he served as its supervising architect, St. Francis Wood appears much as it did 50 or 60 years ago: stately homes set back graciously from the street; tall trees looming over well-groomed lawns; utility lines buried out of sight underground. If you buy a home in St. Francis Wood, you become a member of the home owners association and agree to adhere to the strict “covenants, conditions, and restrictions” (adopted in 1917, and renegotiated in 1950) that regulate work done on house exteriors, including landscaping, paint colors, windows, additions, fences, building materials, and any remodeling that can be seen by neighbors.

The only unregulated concessions to modern times—large, expensive vehicles—are for the most part tucked discreetly into carports, driveways, and garages, with the rare visitor parking on the narrow streets. As might be assumed, on-street parking is not an issue here, although the city’s Department of Parking and Traffic has curiously assigned most streets two-hour time limits, with “O” permits available to residents (perhaps to keep intruders from other neighborhoods from harvesting the ample street parking here).

McDuffie wanted no commercial concerns to intrude on this environment, and so the neighborhood lacks so much as a convenience store or even a coffee shop. Residents do their socializing, restaurant-hopping, shopping, and errands in the adjoining West Portal, across Portola Drive, or at the Lakeshore Plaza on Sloat Boulevard, or even farther afield, at Stonestown Mall on 19th Avenue.

And who are the residents of St. Francis Wood? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the roughly 5,000 residents are predominantly white (60 percent), with a considerable number of Asians (30 percent) and people of African American and mixed race included. They are definitely upper class (median annual household income exceeds $120,000). Nearly everyone (85 percent) owns his or her home.

Public transportation is limited in the neighborhood to the No. 23 bus, which runs east and west along St. Francis Boulevard. Though most residents prefer to drive to their destinations around town, a number commute to downtown jobs via the subway lines (K, L, and M) at West Portal.

The only park in this park-like neighborhood (not including the parkway that is St. Francis Boulevard) is at Santa Clara Avenue and Terrace Drive, where the neighborhood association maintains a playground, tennis and basketball courts, and an inviting green. There are no schools within the neighborhood boundaries, meaning most kids here are driven or bused to public (or, more commonly) private schools elsewhere.

Crime here is light and mostly property related. Over a recent three-month period, there were a few incidents of vandalism and petty theft, in addition to a couple of burglaries. Vehicle thefts and car break-ins are on the rise, however. But there were no homicides in the last three years.

Real estate prices here have tended to remain stable, even during the recent economic downturn, according to Trulia. Granted, many homes are selling for tens of thousands less than asking price, but in percentage terms, it’s relatively low, with a 25 percent increase recorded at the low point of the recession and the 2010 asking prices. Most homes feature multiple bedroom/bathroom combinations. Those along the neighborhood’s less “exclusive” end (along Monterey Boulevard) list for close to $2 million, while the bigger, more grandiose homes (five to eight bedrooms, with four or five bathrooms) up the hillside toward West Portal command asking prices in the $3 million to $4.5 million range. Rentals are strictly controlled, and so monthly prices for even small houses are not readily available.

If you are lucky enough to live (and own) here, St. Francis Wood provides a comforting environment. The punishing wet fog of summer can dampen spirits for a couple of months, but for the most part, an Italian Renaissance revival home on a quiet street is as good a definition of (sub)urban bliss as can be imagined.