Elmwood is known for two things. Beautiful homes and the college avenue stores. The houses and even the apartment buildings are works of arts. Even the shops and the stores show great style in design. Though the houses may be magnificent, what continues to draw people to this neighborhood are its shops. There are clothing stores and antique stores. There are photo supply stores and rug stores. However, restaurants out number all other types of stores by far. In fact, Elmwood was a gourmet ghetto before gourmet ghettos became popular.
The area was originally a land grant to the Ashby brothers . The Ashby brothers saw the possibility of expansion to the area with the advent of the streetcar. They helped lay out the streets (more or less in a grid) and started building houses. Many of the houses were designed by local architect Julia Morgan (including Saint John's church, now the Julia Morgan theater). The one think I like about these land grants are that there are markers indicating the boundaries. In most cases these markers are giant square obelisks with spheres on the top. (By the way, this makes the original western boundary College Ave not Telegraph Ave.) But in Elmwood, where the rich mansions were built, there are actual gates marking the boundary.
My photos of Elmwood are in 3 (4 if you dare to include the Claremont neighborhood) parts. This is partially because of the amorphic nature of the district and part because the pages were so large. This part is the area around College Avenue in Berkeley. The second part of my photos is the mansions near the Claremont spa and resort. The third set of my photos are from further down College Avenue in Oakland's rockridge district.
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