Berkeley: Ratcliff Home Gets Special Sales Treatment
It’s Walter Ratcliff season here in Berkeley.
I wrote about Ratcliff, who was named the city’s architect in 1913, the other week because a couple of his homes have recently come on the market.
Now another one, designed by his son Robert, is for sale at 121 Panoramic Way for $849,000 (pictured right). Built in 1963, the home sits high up in the Claremont hills, above the UC campus, and therefore has what is commonly referred to as “three-bridge” views.
It will be open from next Sunday and, in a rather original move, the realtor has organized a series of events to tie in with the home’s three open-house dates in October.
On October 7, Lucy Ratcliff Pope will share memories of growing up in the hosue and life with three generations of famous Ratcliff architects: grandfather Walter, father Robert and brother Kit.
On October 14 a book by Woodruff Minor, “The Architecture of Ratcliff”, will be offered for sale courtesy of one of my favorite book stores (and goodness knows at the rate they are disappearing we need to support all our good local book stores) , Mrs Dalloway’s.
And on October 21, brochures from the tour of the house that was sponsored by the Berkeley Architectural Association in 2005 will also be offered for sale (although wouldn’t it be nicer if they were complimentary?)
Still, I see nothing wrong with turning an open house into an event. Selling homes can be a difficult business these days so I applaud some innovative thinking in this case.
