Ambassadors of Graciousness

Settling into a new home in Piedmont, California, Benjamin McGriff finds an unexpected connection to his hometown of Montgomery, Alabama: both communities came of age architecturally in the 1920s and 1930s, when skilled craftsmanship and ambitious residential design were unusually accessible. From Albert Farr’s influence on the East Bay hills to Frank Lockwood’s brick Tudors in Montgomery, these houses share an eclecticism rooted in classical principles of proportion, scale, and composition. They are more than artifacts of a particular era—they are generous, enduring places that invite families to layer their own histories into them.