Curran House
San Francisco
David Baker + Partners, Architects

David Baker creates an oasis for family life in a district known for being inhospitable

© Brian Rose

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By John King

Jammed with weary-looking buildings along blocks of drug dealers doing business, San Francisco’s Tenderloin isn’t a neighborhood where you’d expect to find children. But large numbers of Asian immigrant families now live there, drawn by proximity to the downtown shops and restaurants where many newcomers find work.

In 2001, when the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation (TNDC) had a chance to build housing from the ground up, the nonprofit, which manages 1,600 apartments in 21 buildings, knew the population it should serve. “There are 4,000 children in the Tenderloin,” explained Donald Falk, TNDC’s executive director. “There’s a tremendous demand for family housing, and very little exists.”

Curran House, a 67-unit complex where 38 apartments have two or three bedrooms, opened in 2005. It rises from a lot that’s long and relatively shallow, wedged between aged apartment buildings on three sides. Zoning set the height of one side of the lot at 85 feet and the other at 120 feet, with a 20-foot setback from the street at the sixth floor. Parking spaces were required despite proximity to subway and bus lines.

“This is the hardest floor plan we’ve ever done—a Rubik’s Cube puzzle where we had this volume and had to slide the units in,” said Curran House architect David Baker, FAIA, who has made a specialty of high-density and often low-cost housing.

Want the full story? Read the entire article in our February 2006 issue.
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Formal name of Project:
Curran House

Location:
San Francisco

Gross square footage:
83,690 sq. ft.

Total construction cost:
$15 million

Owner:
Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation

Architect:
David Baker + Partners, Architects
461 Second Street, c127
San Francisco, CA 94107
P: 415.896.6700
F: 415.896.6103
www.dbarchitect.com