Things to do / Travel Guide
Address:1645 Gough St.
San Francisco, California
Tel:
(415) 441-7512
See early American furniture, portraits, silver, pewter, looking glasses and English and Chinese ceramics! Along with historic documents with the signatures of 54 of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, the Octagon House in California is an architectural and historical landmark not to be missed!
The odd design of Octagon house, built in 1861, is based on a popular theory of the mid-1800s, that people inhabiting a space of this shape would live healthier, happier lives. The eight-sided house sits across the street from its original site on Gough Street and is covered in a pretty blue-gray exterior, adjacent to a colonial-style garden and filled with antique American furniture and decorative arts such as paintings, silver, rugs, and documents from the 18th and 19th centuries.
Octagon House is a unique stop-in for visitors who can see a deck of revolutionary era hand-painted playing cards which, in place of kings, queens and jacks, are American statesmen, Roman goddesses, and Indian chiefs. Architecture buffs will appreciate the strange structure, where from the second floor you can look up into the cupola, which is illuminated at night. Even if you're not able to visit the inside, it is worth a look from the outside too.
To get to Octagon House, take Muni bus: 41 Union, 42 Downtown Loop, 45 Union-Stockton, 47 Van Ness, 49 Van Ness-Mission, 76 Marin Headlands.
This three-story brick house, adapted to an irregular-shaped lot, displays a dramatic break with the traditional, late Georgian and early Federal house planning that preceded it. The Octagon achieves a zenith in Federal architecture in the United States, through its brilliant plan which combines a circle, two rectangles, and a triangle, and through the elegance and restraint of the interior and exterior decoration. The Coade stone, stoves, other decorative elements, and furniture were imported from England. The construction materials, such as bricks, timber, iron, and Acquia creek sandstone were all manufactured locally.