New Condos Downtown San Diego: Neo-Classical Architecture

I don't know about you, but I am not that familiar with different styles of architecture. I can tell the difference between Spanish and Modern, but there is always someone who knows more.  I decided to slowly educate myself a little bit at a time. If you are interested in architecture, this may be too basic and simple, but if you are like me, you might learn something new.

Then: Backesto Building with the Bank of AmericaThis building located at 614 5th Ave. in the Gaslamp District is the Backesto building. The building was originally built in 1873 and was named after a Philadelphia physician, Dr. John Pierre Backesto. Dr. Backesto invested in downtown San Diego although he retired and lived out the rest of his life in San Jose.

The original tenants included clothiers, milliners, jewelers, a grocery store, liquor store, general merchandisers, hardware store, real estate offices, photographer's studio, and ship

chandlers and steamship companies. (wikimapia)

This was also the original home of San Diego Hardware, although San Diego Hardware relocated in 1923.

The Backesto building was the first building in the Gaslamp to be restored. The building is "classical revival and when restored, great attention was paid to detail. The goal was to give the feeling of the old Gaslamp era.

Now: Backesto Building in the Gaslamp DistrictI researched to find out what classical revival architecture is and learned that Classical revival architecture means someone liked Greek and Roman architecture and tried to construct buildings with that flavor.

This original "classical" style architecture has other names such as Early Classical Revival, Jeffersonian Classicism, Neo-classical Revival, and Roman Classicism. These buildings were built generally in the 1800's and you will see a lot of older public buildings in this style.

The buildings tend to be simple and dignified and many of them are quite large. The style shows some common elements such as Roman or Greek temple styles. Like most things, classical revival architecture went out of style, and like most things, classical revival reemerged again during 1895 to 1940. Architects during this timeframe borrowed heavily from the classical revival, but made their own modifications, and then renamed it neo-classical style.

I cannot touch in enough depth the history of the Blackesto building, so if you are interested you can read more about the building in the Journal of San Diego History. There was a Blackesto building one and building two, plus a partial building collapse and a fire.

If you have any further details for neo-classical I hope you will comment on this blog.


By Sharyn & Victoria Crown, Downtown San Diego real estate brokers

This is part of a series of articles entitled, New Condos, Downtown San Diego Style


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