Colonel Irving Salomon—industrialist, philanthropist, diplomat—led a full life. A soldier during both world wars, Salomon made his fortune at the Royal Metal Manufacturing Company, after which he turned diplomat, serving his country as a delegate to the United Nations under President Eisenhower. Although Salomon moved through the cosmopolitan world of international affairs, he also led a simpler life as a rancher in Valley Center, a rural community north of San Diego. Life on the ranch offered a tranquil respite from political intrigue, but Salomon craved the bright-lights-and-big-city atmosphere he enjoyed back East. He decided on having a New York–style penthouse atop an apartment building in San Diego and purchased a site on Sixth Avenue. In 1958, the commission for the project was granted to La Jolla–based architect Henry Hester.
“Within the context of San Diego, Hester was extremely progressive,” says Keith York, program director at KPBS television and amateur historian who runs the website ModernSanDiego.com. “The Salomon Apartments were boldly designed for where they were set. You have Irving Gill architecture nearby, the 1930s Balboa Park across the street, and then Hester built a great 3-D set of cubes.”
The Salomon Apartments building that Hester designed—30 rental units crowned with a 2,715-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-bath penthouse—was marketed as “San Diego’s Most Distinguished Place to Live.” With the Salomons anchoring the penthouse, the building quickly filled up with some of San Diego’s most prominent citizens. The Sullivan family, owners of a large lumber company, took up residence, as did architect Leonard Veitzer. “It was one of the finest apartment buildings in which people could live in those days,” says Theodore Mintz, who along with his partner Richard Mabie served as general contractor on the project.
Almost 50 years later, Del Mar Heritage purchased the apartment block from Salomon’s heirs, converted it to condominiums, rebranded it as 3200 Sixth Avenue, and attempted to restore the structure’s original period details while integrating modern-day amenities.
Del Mar hired San Diego–based McGeough LaFrance Architects to supervise the restoration. Carolyn LaFrance, who had long admired the building from afar, now found herself more impressed than ever. “It’s such a great example of how to design an elegant multifamily structure,” she says, praising the flexible floor plans and the use of floor-to-ceiling glass in 12 of the units that look into the park.
The spirit of the restoration project has been to match the original 1959 state of the building as closely as possible. Ash cabinetry and pendant light fixtures were restored when possible, and otherwise replicated. The architects teamed up with Mintz on some detective work to determine the original color of the building’s exterior. Eventually, LaFrance found a few places where the gray-green color remained and were able to match the tint, which Mintz confirmed.
Hester is widely praised among San Diego architects, but not everyone agrees on the originality of his contributions. John Eisenhart, owner of the San Diego architecture firm Union, admires the Hester homes for their consistency and their proportions, but doesn’t see Hester as an innovator. “He reworked the rectangular box and he did it better than most,” says Eisenhart. “I think his legacy is not so much in being original, but in taking the modernist movement across America in the ’50s and doing quality buildings that distill down the era.”
Photographer Julius Shulman, whose images were used in the original marketing materials for the Salomon Apartments (and again today for 3200 Sixth Avenue) offered his own perspective. “I always considered Hester one of the best San Diego architects,” he says. “He represented a good period of architecture when San Diego was just beginning to express itself in favor of modernism. In the early years, the so-called International Style prevalent among most architects like [Richard] Neutra was not accepted. Neutra was very austere with his proverbial glass box. Hester and others warmed up the work quite a bit and edited it in a way that clients would accept.”
2 / Hester graduated from USC School of Architecture around 1947. Now 81 years old and married twice, Hester has two children.
3 / Hester was able to choose architectural commissions without worrying about finances. According to Jonathan Segal, he may have received an inheritance from his mother that financed his practice.
4 / Hester formed a number of short-lived partnerships with architects, including Fred Liebhardt, Ronald K. Davis, and William Cody. He then formed a professional and social bond with architect Robert E. Jones that lasted through much of the ’60s.
5 / For decades Hester lived in a home he designed on Torrey Pines Road in La Jolla. When he moved out, he left behind a number of personal effects that the new owners discovered—original photographs of his buildings, blueprints, and drawings.
6 / In addition to the homes he built in San Diego, Hester was also involved in residential developments in Denver and Albuquerque.
7 / Hester rebuffed any attempts to solicit his opinions on the Salomon Apartments restoration.
8 / According to Jonathan Segal, Hester doesn’t even want his name associated with the redone 3200 Sixth Avenue. “Nobody wants their work touched,” sympathizes Segal. “It’s like someone is restoring your painting and thinks the color blue you used isn’t right so they want to use lavender.”
9 / Colonel Salomon passed over John Lloyd Wright, the son of Frank Lloyd Wright, in choosing Hester as the architect for his home.
10 / Homes designed by Hester are scattered throughout La Jolla. In 2004, a 1986 Hester home named Coast Walk was on the market for nearly $6 million.
