This photo, taken from the south-east corner of 6th and Santa Clara, shows the building in all its glory. Our apartment, 1102, is the rightmost pair of windows on the top floor.

This plaque, just outside the front door, gives the building’s vital statistics. The architect, William Weeks, was very prolific, designing numerous buildings up and down the west coast of the US. Erica and I were walking in Tacoma a few years back and saw a building that looked just like ours. Some investigations revealed that it too was a William Weeks medico-dental building that had been converted to city offices.

This picture shows the building entrance from across Santa Clara St.

This is a close up of the main entrance, showing some of the intricate stone work.

The very summit of the building highlights the attention to detail that went into this building. By the way, the two windows on the right side of the very top floor are the windows for our apartment.

Beautiful marble is used in the building's main public areas. This photo was taken from the centre of the front part of the lobby, looking towards the feature staircase (original wrought iron) and the rear door (modern aluminium).

This picture reveals some of the intricate detail of the feature staircase.

The lobby is decorated with two gorgeous marble benches.

This was a very hard picture to take because the light from the window overwhelms the detail of the woodwork in the window frame.

This was taken from the rear of the lobby looking backwards towards the main entrance. Note how the light reflects in the marble ‘mirror’ on the side wall. The car you see is actually a reflection. Also note the modern, but appropriately deco, light fittings and the modern, and ugly, aluminium doors.

The building was built with two elevators, which are still in service today. In fact, one of the major repairs to the building in recent years was the renovation of the elevator mechanisms. This involved removing the motors from their housing on the top floor using a big crane, sending them to the east coast to be rebuilt, and then reinstalling them. This was done one elevator at a time to minimise the inconvenience to residents. Walking up 11 flights of stairs is not fun. I’ve had to do it a few times because of power failures and other elevator problems.

This photo shows the front part of the lobby ceiling. Note the similarity to the ceilings inside the top floor apartments. Also note the similar water damage! You can also see the tops of the marble mirrors on the side walls.

The rear ceiling of the lobby is in much better shape. The original hand-stencilled paintwork is in excellent condition.

This close up of the rear lobby ceiling reveals the beautiful paintwork perfectly.

The five apartments on the top floor are all split level, with the living area downstairs and the bedroom upstairs. In the three apartments at the front of the building the upstairs is actually a mezzanine. This photos shows the front half of the upstairs area of our apartment. On the far wall you can see our gargoyle.

How many San Josean have gargoyles built in to their bedrooms? Isn’t it beautiful!

This cornice balances the gargoyle at the other end of the front wall.

This closeup of the ceiling shows the beautiful stencilled design that decorates the beams and arches in our apartment. Unfortunately the paint is decaying with time, and needs renovation. However, the paint looks a lot better in real life than it does in this photo. The harsh light of the flash strongly reflects from the plaster that’s visible due to paint wear.

Our apartment had access to a large roof deck. This photo was taken from the deck, looking back towards the roof of the building and the flag pole. Amazingly enough, two pigeons managed to nest in the space behind the three ring decorative motif above our french doors.

This is a close up of the gargoyle that lives on the roof line. The ball above its head is the top of the flag pole.

Probably the worst thing about Vintage Tower is the area in which it’s located. These wonderfully euphamistic signs are just one indication of its unsavoury nature. But hey, there is some hope. The city of San Jose plans to build its new city hall directly across the street. There’s already been some progress, namely the demolition of the ‘Taco Hell’ that used to stand just opposite Vintage Tower.