The house is unmissable. Its colorful exterior, a painted forest of faces.
Latino artists, activists and musicians, suspended mid-motion, grin down at passersby. A spotted jaguar sprawls across the garage door. Around the border of one of its windows, a message is written in all-caps: "It takes the hood to save the hood."
This is the "Latin Rock House," an enduring tribute to the culture and history of the Mission District, one of San Francisco's oldest — and most dramatically gentrified — neighborhoods. Last month, San Francisco lawmakers unanimously declared the Latin Rock House a historic landmark, formally protecting the Spanish-style home from being painted over, altered or destroyed by future owners or developers without the city's permission. The house has been the site of jam sessions and musical creation, community festivals and celebrations and ongoing efforts to engage the city's youth in music. It's also a home, where Richard and Tammy Segovia live.
"Now we can say this piece of the city is ours," said owner Richard Segovia, 72, a fifth-generation San Franciscan who was born and raised in the Mission.
"This is for us," he said. "Our culture. Our music. Our people. It's amazing."
Among San Francisco's more than 300 historic landmarks — including the Golden Gate Bridge and colonial-era Mission Dolores church — there are several residences. Most are traditional in style or notable for the historic events that happened within. The city's most recognizable historic homes may be the row of pastel Victorians known as the Painted Ladies, which were included in the opening credits of the sitcom Full House.
None look like Segovia's house of Latin rock.
In a neighborhood that has seen decades of redevelopment, skyrocketing home prices and the displacement of thousands of Latino families, this mural-wrapped home is more than a marker of the Mission's cultural vibrancy. It's a stake in the ground, Segovia said. A sign to tourists and transplants of what this neighborhood has long represented.
"This house is like the whole neighborhood. You see it from the outside and you think wow, such a beautiful painting," Segovia said. "But then you come inside and you spend some time and you realize all the culture and history that was built here."
A changing neighborhood
The Mission District is one of San Francisco's oldest enclaves. Originally the homeland of the Ohlone Indians, the Mission was taken over by Spanish settlers in the 1700s and so named after the Catholic church at its center, now known as Mission Dolores.
In the centuries that followed, the Mission went from Mexican farmland to immigrant stronghold as waves of working-class European families moved into the neighborhood following the Gold Rush in the mid-1800s. After the great San Francisco fire of 1906 wiped out much of the city's downtown, the Mission transformed into a commercial district. Over the next several decades, Mexican American families poured in and set down roots.
In 1950, only about 11% of Mission residents would have been considered Latino, according to the California Migration Museum, but by the 1970s, that number had swelled to nearly half.
Segovia's family moved into the house in 1963. He was 10 years old.
"I've seen all of the changes this neighborhood has been through — the good, bad and ugly — and now? My god, I wouldn't even be able to afford to live here today" had he not inherited his home from his parents, Segovia said.
The tech boom that began in the 1990s brought waves of new residents to the city and sent home prices soaring. Eviction rates jumped and some community centers and shops that served a primarily Latino population closed.
Supervisor Jackie Fielder, who represents the Mission neighborhood in San Francisco's legislature, said the area has lost more than 12,000 Latino residents over the last 25 years.
Up and down the block where Segovia's house sits, property values have soared close to $2 million. The Mexican American family that used to live next door, he said, is gone. Graywashed modern homes, like the one next door, have replaced houses painted bright blues and yellows, a stark contrast to the vibrant palette of the neighborhood.
"There's this thing that happens with gentrification where the newcomers tend to ignore whatever conversation is happening in a place aesthetically or culturally because they don't feel like they have to participate," said Sergio De La Torre, a professor at the University of San Francisco who has studied the demographic change happening in the Mission. "In a neighborhood where these gray, muted houses have really multiplied, this guy is doing the exact opposite. This is the other extreme. It's as loud as a house can be."
Fielder said she was struck with the idea to landmark the Latin Rock House during a community event there earlier this year.
"It's owned by a native San Franciscan, and it's beloved by the community," she said. "Seeing the mural for myself, seeing the over 87 musicians painted on there alongside traditional Chicano and Aztec motifs, I was like, wow, we have to preserve this. So, that's when we got to work."
San Francisco is the historic birthplace of Latin rock, Fielder added.
As psychedelic rock took over the city in the 1960s, Latino artists blended it with Afro-Cuban beats and percussive sounds more commonly found in jazz and salsa. Artists like Carlos Santana distinguished the genre and brought it to a worldwide audience.
Segovia, a percussionist, has always filled his home with music – playing impromptu concerts for the neighborhood out of open garage doors or inviting friends and fellow musicians over to jam. Eventually, he retrofitted his childhood bedroom into a recording studio.
The cover art for Santana's 1999 record, Supernatural, was created inside Segovia's home, he said.
'I'm holding down my roots'
The petition to preserve Segovia's house was recommended by the Historic Preservation Commission and approved unanimously by the city's legislature after supporters and neighbors testified before the board, lauding its impact and cultural significance to the community.
"What this kind of landmarking does is preserve this part of the neighborhood that has been subject to a lot of displacement and gentrification," Fielder said, adding "it's to preserve an irreplaceable piece of San Francisco's Latino heritage and musical history."
But to some, the preservation effort is a superficial solution to an underlying problem: the erasure of culture and the ongoing displacement of Latino families.
De La Torre, who also lives in the neighborhood, sees the historic designation as lip service: a superficial attempt to preserve the culture and community of the Mission, instead of tackling issues that vex families who live there day in and day out.
Among the things the neighborhood would stand to benefit from, De La Torre said, are financial and legal support for street vendors who keep the commerce district alive, drug treatment programs, and housing assistance.
"They could work on more social programs for kids, for example, but they're not doing that," De La Torre said. "It's an easy way out to commit to this thing, to say we care about you guys and we're going to give you things to keep the Latin Rock House alive, but nothing else."
Segovia's house didn't always look like this.
Ten years ago, Segovia received a grant from the California Art Commission to paint a mural on the exterior of his home.
"That's when I decided to make my house the House of Latin rock," Segovia said. "I'm letting the new techie generation know that I'm not going anywhere. I'm holding down my roots."
The walls commemorate artists that have made their mark on the genre, like Santana and jazz percussionist Pete Escovedo, as well as civil rights activists like Dolores Huerta.
Inside the house, new artists are still being molded.
Bands like the all-female salsa group Agua Pura and the young Los Jefes have taken up unofficial residencies in Segovia's home, using his instruments, recording booths and expertise in the industry to help shape their own sound.
Segovia's wife, Tammy, brings them snacks as they jam.
For musicians like Rebecca Rodriguez, 26, the Latin Rock House is a second home, a safe place to experiment and grow as an artist.
"It's just this magical musical house," said Rodriguez, the band leader of Agua Pura. "It's like a museum, but a museum that's still so alive."
On the walls of the performance space are the name and signatures of artists who have come through the house. Rodriguez said she and her bandmates have added their names. So, too, have members of Los Jefes, who were only in high school when they started working together on their first EP at the house.
To have their names on the walls, Rodriguez said, feels like being part of something bigger than just the house. It feels like making a mark on the culture, the music she loves and, now, the city itself.
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