You know the ones.
Here: http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2009/06/wwdc-2009-keynote-1176-rm-eng.jpg
Also seen on Full House, and any movie that has San Francisco, but not Lombard Street.
What’s the story behind these houses? How incredibly expensive would it be to own? Do they get crazy amounts of lookie lou traffic?
a.k.a. the Painted Ladies.
3 minutes. Damn. I LOVE THIS PLACE!
Pricewise, you’re looking at $1,500,000
That’s surprisingly ‘not bad’, considering californias usual housing market, and what a high-rise loft can go for.
I’m on my iPhone, or I’d post a link to zillow, the houses are larger than expected…5 br, 2 ba, 3000 sq ft.
ETA:Linky here: http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/720-Steiner-St-San-Francisco-CA-94117/15078281_zpid/
(dupe)
Completely and totally off topic, but I could not let the singularly apposite username/post combination here go without noting it. 
alas, its a frequent occurrence. (hence the name)
Holy crap, that’s an ugly house. I’m sure it’s fairly authentic to the period (well, maybe not the painted bathroom floor), but just looking at the pictures made me claustrophobic.
When it reopens the Archbishop’s Mansion is just around the corner from Alamo Park, which is where the photos of the Painted Ladies are taken from. We went there once for my birthday, wonderful place.
It’s as close as you can get to living in one without shelling out $2 million or so.
Funny, 'cause I’d adore to have a house like that. The wallpaper sure is ugly, but that’s part of what I love about them!
A friend of mine recently purchased a nice victorian in SF for $1.2M that needed a fair amount of work. What struck me was how it was chopped up into lots of small rooms, which was typical of that period, but not particularly functional. There’s an entry, parlor, formal dining room and living room, and a few small bathrooms scattered here and there. The ceilings are tall and it echos when you walk through it. It’s also very cold since it has an archaic heating system.
By contrast I just designed and built a house with a large great room that includes a kitchen, family room and dining room with no walls separating the various areas. It works much better for my family and is easier to maintain and keep clean than separate rooms. In my previous house I had a formal living room and dining room that rarely got used. It was wasted space as far as I was concerned.
It’s functional for what they wanted at the time. Now, we prefer big open spaces. Back then it was more seen as separate parts of the house are completely different and thus should be separated from view. The parlor is where you first entertain visitors. If they were close, they may be invited to your less formal (and more personal) family/living room. People never hung out in kitchens like they do today. Compartmentalizing was important.
Was it also because then they could heat one room at a time (fireplaces) and the heat would remain close?
smaller rooms are easier to heat (esp. with the high 9 foot plus ceilings), and many older houses have rod holders on the door ways to hang curtains that helped keep out drafts.
