Urban Landscape, Native Landscape: Midtown Sacramento

Friday, October 16, 2020

Midtown Sacramento

Photos taken in April 2018

Click here for more photos of Midtown Sacramento.

From my travel journal on 4-13-18: We went for dinner at Jack’s Urban Eats in Midtown, then walked around that area & had gelato. There were several gay businesses there, but it was also the main business district for all of Midtown Sacramento: a large, vibrant commercial & residential area. There were many beautiful Victorian houses, some used as offices. There were a few large new apartment buildings similar to those in Seattle. There was a light rail system. We liked it very much. 4-14-18: At 7 AM, I walked for a mile from the motel, through Midtown, to the commercial area where we had been the night before. I took lots of photos. Our motel was at the edge of Midtown, which covers about 2 square miles. There was a street market that morning. I bought bread.

Midtown is the most attractive, interesting & vibrant neighborhood in Sacramento. It is adjacent to & east of Downtown. It lies between R St & J St, 16th St & 30th St. Most of the neighborhood is residential. The Victorian, Queen Anne & Craftsman homes are charming & mostly well-maintained. Midtown is Sacramento's main area for restaurants, bars, clubs, boutiques, art galleries & various small businesses. They cluster between 18th & 21st, N & J streets & also spread east along J St to 27th St. The Midtown Farmers Market takes place year-round, every Saturday, on 20th St between J St & L St in the center of this business district. Sacramento's small LGBTQ entertainment district & community center is located nearby at K St & 20th St.

Starting around 1890, Sacramento began to spread east from 16th St to Alhambra Blvd. The J St & K St business corridors were extended from downtown. This area of mixed housing & business was later called Midtown. Buffalo Brewing started in 1890 at 21st St & Q St, the largest brewery west of the Mississippi. Sutter's Fort was restored & rebuilt from 1891 to 1893. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1961. Firehouse No. 3 was built in 1893 at 1215 19th St & listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991. Memorial Auditorium opened in 1927 at 15th St & J St. California Packing Corporation (CalPak) Plant #11 began operations in 1930 at 17th St & C St. Sutter Memorial Hospital opened in 1937 as Sutter Maternity Hospital at 29th St & Capitol Ave.

The Capitol Mansions Historic District is located in Midtown between 22nd St & 27th St, Kayak Alley (between Capitol Ave & L St) & Matsui Alley (between Capitol Ave & N St). It is a group of more than 150 large, stately structures that were originally single-family residences. The features, characteristics & materials of the structures are consistent with Queen Anne & Classic Box/Foursquare homes. The latter is a sub-type of Colonial Revival homes, built prior to 1915. More than 150 structures were listed when Capitol Mansions became a historic district in 2004.

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This blog began in 2008 as Metropolitan Gardens to provide information on gardening in Seattle & places like it. Click on Gardening in Cascadia. The blog expanded to include Parks P-Patches Public Gardens in the US, Canada & Europe. Then Nature was added. (The difference between nature & gardens is intent. Nature happens. Gardens are planned.) Many recent posts are not about Seattle, or even Cascadia. They are Urban Landscape: streetscape & architecture. Cascadia is the region including the Cascade Mountains of Washington & Oregon. If you want to contact the blogger, leave a message in comments. Comments are moderated & private messages will not be posted.

Our Land & Climate

The city of Seattle rests between 2 bodies of water: Puget Sound & Lake Washington. Puget Sound is a substantial part of the Salish Sea & a very small part of the Pacific Ocean. The Salish Sea is set apart from the Pacific by the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington & Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia. The dense, wet clouds of the Pacific Ocean travel as far as the Cascade Mountains, near the Salish Sea & not very far from the ocean. East of the Cascades lies the desert of the Columbia Basin. The moist, temperate climate of Seattle extends south to northern California & north to southeastern Alaska. The Pacific Northwest Coast from San Francisco Bay to Cook Inlet shares a flora dominated by evergreen coniferous forest. The central portion, west of the Cascade Mountains, is called Cascadia. The climate is cool & wet from fall to spring, warm & dry in summer. The Olympic Mountains block Seattle from much of the Pacific rainfall. Seattle is drier than the Atlantic coast of North America & northern Europe, cooler in summer & warmer in winter. It lies near the latitude of Paris & Quebec City.