San Francisco - Spreckels Mansion

The Spreckels Mansion, situated two blocks west of Van Ness Avenue in the district known as Pacific Heights, is noteworthy both on account of the man who built it and for its architecture.

Adolph B Spreckels was the son of Claus Spreckels, an immigrant from Hanover in Germany; Spreckels senior made his fortune as the "sugar king" of California. The architect of the mansion was George Applegarth, who took as his model a French Baroque palace.

Applegarth chose white stone for the building, which occupies the space of half a block. Three years later, in 1915, Spreckels entrusted him with an even more ambitious project, the design of the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park, which the millionaire and his wife bequeathed to the city.

Twenty-seven rooms have been turned into tourist accommodation.