Julia Morgan's Berkeley City Club: The Story of a Building

Julia Morgan's Berkeley City Club: The Story of a Building is the remarkable account of a Berkeley landmark that came into being at the crest of the Early Women's Movement in 1930. Dreaming of a better life, twelve Berkeley women's clubs organized the Berkeley Women's City Club for the purpose of building a community clubhouse that would serve their needs for meeting, dining, living, and playing together, as well as the needs of the larger community for meeting rooms and recreation. They commissioned the great woman architect, Julia Morgan, to design the clubhouse. Morgan fulfilled the dreams of the clubwomen with a unique medieval fantasy in reinforced concrete that, at 46,105 square feet, was one of the largest women's clubhouses in the United States. Many photographs and plans drawn from the club archives illustrate Morgan's aesthetic achievement, visible in the quality and arrangement of the abstract shapes of the clubhouse, her expert handling of light and space, and her rich use of cast stone ornament. Her individual treatment of each of the public rooms is marked by grace and elegance, culminating in the spectacular beauty of the building's tiled pool. The club archives document how much members and the community loved and used the clubhouse over the years since it first opened on November 20, 1930. They lived the dream. And even though inflation and a declining membership made upkeep difficult, preserving their beloved clubhouse was always a priority for members. They admitted men in 1963 and changed the club's name to the Berkeley City Club, but the clubhouse remained intact and unchanged. Today, the clubhouse stands as a monument to the genius of its architect and the devotion of those who kept it whole.