Blocker: 400 Ivy

Thing is, there’s not much going on here on the Octavia/Laguna-bordered block of Ivy, itself a narrow, one-way, well-canopied side street that runs east to west from Franklin to Webster. Ivy’s lack of action is by design – it’s a relatively untrammeled lane that gets by on its looks rather than its poor function as a throughway. During our 30-minute visit on a sunny weekday afternoon, exactly two vehicles, zero bicyclists, and maybe four pedestrians pass through.

Not that there isn’t anything to see, because there certainly is – it just doesn’t jump into a visitor’s face. For starters, some tree-trimming has just occurred earlier today at the east end of the block, and that’s something to be excited about. Given the Ivy pavement’s slender width, time spent here is time often spent looking upward – at the variety of mature street trees along the slim sidewalks, at the slightly rusted but eye-catching beams that support the top-floor balcony at 415 Ivy, at the tenuous fire escape ladders.

A series of antique perfume, wine, and beer bottles line a shelf in the front window at 475, across from a large brown shingle building at 452-454 that’s both quintessential Northern California and a fresh look in shingle-deficient San Francisco. There’s even a second, smaller brown shingle home down toward Octavia, at 424. These places create a welcoming, amber mood that this block’s single blight – a weed-strewn lot graciously blocked by plywood and chain link right next to the larger brown shingle structure – can’t crash.

A woman walks down the north side sidewalk, punches in an access code to the garage at 432, and disappears inside. Across the street, a man talks semi-animatedly on his phone as he heads the opposite direction. Once he turns the corner onto Octavia, the Afro-beat music comes back into audible focus. The pigeon has flown, but the owl remains. That owl’s not going anywhere soon. That owl’s made of wood.

(Photos by the author.)