461 6th Avenue
Richmond Police Station
Richmond District
The Richmond District Police Station was built in 1927 in a red-brick Romanesque Revival style.
The Horse Barn
Behind the police station this brick building housed horses with a loft to hold their feed in the back. Both buildings were renovated in 1990 and the horse building now houses offices as well as a neighborhood community room.
I had come to the Police Station to photograph and write about the glass entry door by Shelly Jurs.
Shelly Jurs trained in architectural glass techniques at the Cummings Studio in San Rafael, California (1973-74) and the Swansea College of Art, South Wales, Great Britain, in 1975. She did a formal apprenticeship training at the Willets Stained Glass Studio, Philadelphia, PA, 1976-77. She served as personal Assistant to Ludwig Schaffrath, a major figure in the glass art renaissance of post-war Germany and a world-renowned architectural glass designer. In October of 1978 she opened her own architectural glass studio in Oakland, California and has since completed well over 200 custom architectural glass works.
A delightful policeman invited me in to see the rest of the station. This Bronze, Granite and Marble piece in the lobby of the Police Station is by Jaap (Jacob) Bong. Bong has a piece on Fire Station #24 that you can see here. Jaap Bongers was born in Stein, Holland and studied at the Jan Van Eyck Academie of Fine Arts and the Stadsacademie of Fine Arts, both in Maastricht, Holland. In addition to his travels to Africa, Bongers also visited the United States for the first time in 1985 and settled permanently in San Jose in 1987.
On the wall behind this mosaic were these lovely framed originals of the police station’s blueprints.
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Love the door and the floor piece. I have had some nice tours given by police and security people too – restores your faith somehow that they like to show off the art.
I really like the floor inlay. Very interesting piece and in contrast to the rest of the building.