CELEBRATING OUR 2018 JULIA MORGAN AWARD
Everdell Coburn, Edward Westbrook, and Elisa Stancil
Every other year the The Northern California Chapter of The Institute of Classical Architecture and Art (ICAA) hosts the Julia Morgan Awards to celebrate excellence in classical and traditional design. This year, QuarryHouse was awarded for its work of stonemasonry historic restoration performed to the rooftop balustrade, parapet fascia and coping of the Hibernia Bank Building, a key San Francisco landmark. The project required the removal of existing granite masonry, seismic restoration and reconstruction of damaged portions, and reinstallation. Work was performed on the building rooftop adjacent to the historic cupola in downtown San Francisco.
Technical challenges involved the system of cranes/gantries created to move 525 individual pieces of stone weighing from 200-1700 pounds each; removal from roof parapet, transportation to warehouse for cleaning, patching and in some cases re-fabrication from new stock; then replacement at original position to within 1/8" accuracy. Stones were set in place using heavy seismic anchors. A Dutchman patch system was developed that was approved by the San Francisco Historic Review Commission.
Work required meticulous accuracy in historic pointing mortars and in matching stone patches to existing petinas, with the goal that the building would look untouched when completed. The project's success was that in looking at the final building roofline, one saw no signs of the restoration work.
