Review by Zara Raab in Professional & Domestic Designs for The Mirror of the Mechanics’ Institute Library:

September 2012 Excerpt:
“The young Bertrand, recently graduated from Berkeley’s architectural degree program, soon begins a long career in government, overseeing architectural projects for the Navy, while all the time single-handedly raising her daughter. So her daughter can attend the French-American Bilingual School in San Francisco, Bertrand buys a charming, weathered “Workers’ Victorian” on a steep hill in San Francisco in 1975, calling it her maisonette. Bertrand is passionate, throwing herself into both her career and maisonette on 27th Street, with its vistas of the Bay and East Bay hills. From the moment she moves in, this house becomes one of two true loves of her life. (The second is a cabin in Gasquet in remote Northern California.) “I slowly engaged in a tenderly curious acquaintance with my living space,” Bertrand writes, “exploring the limitations and opportunities” of the space, as “preening and nesting became an integral part” of her San Francisco life [207]. Bertrand pays attention to her space as she might to a lover or as a mother attends her child. Like any artist, she undertakes the house in large part because she sees its possibilities. “How could I hold on to the house’s century-old character while still making the place contemporary? “What could be done to catch the country feeling in the city—with modesty and elegance?” [210].”