Julia Morgan was born the second of five children to a wealthy family in Oakland. She studied engineering at UC Berkeley (there was no architectural program at the time) and graduated as the first woman at the university to receive a BS degree in Civil Engineering in 1894. During her senior year she had attended a lecture given by local architect Bernard Maybeck[1], who would go on to mentor Morgan and several of her classmates. Maybeck encouraged Morgan to apply to the famous architectural school, L’Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the school he himself attended. Morgan applied three times before finally being accepted. Though the program was five years in duration, Morgan finished in three. After graduating in 1902 she obtained a job in San Francisco working under local architect John Galen Howard. Howard had been commissioned to build additional structures on the UC Berkeley campus and Morgan designed the still-standing Hearst Greek Theater.
In 1904 Morgan became the first woman to obtain an architectural license in California. She opened an office in San Francisco and her first commission was to design the 72–foot campanile bell tower at Mills College in Oakland. The 1906 Earthquake and Fires[2] destroyed Morgan’s San Francisco office; however, the bell tower at Mills College, which Morgan had designed using reinforced concrete, sustained no damage. She would open her new office on the top floor of the Merchants Exchange Building[5] where she would remain for the duration of her career. The aftermath of the earthquake was a prosperous time for Morgan, whose next commission was restoring the fire-damaged Fairmont Hotel[3]. The project was completed in under a year and garnered Morgan national recognition. She went on to get commissions rebuilding businesses, residences, churches and schools.
Influential socialite Phoebe Hearst, whom Morgan had met while attending UC Berkeley, introduced the architect to her son William Randolph Hearst. Hearst would ultimately hire Morgan for the majority of his building needs including, in 1919, La Cuesta Encantada, known today as Hearst Castle, in San Simeon, California. Morgan would continue to work with Hearst on additions to this estate until 1947 when Hearst’s health began to fail.
In 1923 Morgan bought a house at 2231 Divisadero in Pacific Heights. In April 1929 she bought the adjacent house and combined both properties into one structure. She never married and favored a modest lifestyle. She gave few interviews and never participated in contests. She retired in 1951 at the age of 79, destroying all of her files and blueprints. This ultimately led to case law regarding what a broker can say before representing that a famous architect designed or remodeled a home after many brokers tried to take advantage of the fact that there was no longer any documentation verifying work that Morgan may or may not have done.
Buildings designed by Morgan that still stand in San Francisco today include the YWCA (now the Chinese Historical Society of America at 965 Clay, the Katherine Burke School at 3065 Jackson (now University High School) and the Donaldina Cameron Building[4] at 920 Sacramento.
Morgan died on February 2, 1957 at the age of 85 and was buried at Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland. In 1995 her office space in the Merchant’s Exchange Building was transformed into an entertainment venue and renamed the Julia Morgan Ballroom[6]. Although she will be most remembered for Hearst Castle, Morgan was responsible for over 700 projects in and around San Francisco.
[1] Bernard Maybeck: story coming July 14th
[2] 1906 Earthquake and Fires: https://thesanfranciscophoenix.com/?p=2849
[3] Fairmont Hotel: story coming January 9th
[4] Donaldina Cameron: https://thesanfranciscophoenix.com/?p=4344
[5] Merchants Exchange Building: https://thesanfranciscophoenix.com/?p=4971
[6] Visit them at https://juliamorganballroom.com
