716 Montgomery Street

Address in San Francisco’s old artists’ quarter, near Montgomery Street’s north end. In Hayden Herrera’s Frida it is sculptor Ralph Stackpole’s studio, Frida and Diego Rivera’s home on their first stay in the United States.

At a glance

Source	Author	Role	In one line
Frida	Hayden Herrera	setting	Stackpole’s studio, where the couple live from November 1930, with the Blanches two flights below.

Frida — Hayden Herrera (1983)

Source: Frida - A Biography of Frida Kahlo · Original · Readwise highlight

They arrived on November 10 and moved into Ralph Stackpole’s large studio at 716 Montgomery Street, in the old artists’ quarter.

• Role: setting
• In the book: In Chapter 9, “Gringolandia”, Frida and Rivera arrive in San Francisco on November 10, 1930, Rivera holding mural commissions arranged by Stackpole. The painter Lucile Blanch and her husband live two flights below; the Riveras, with no phone, use theirs, and Lucile remembers Frida as too shy about her paintings to show them. Edward Weston records meeting Rivera in “Ralph’s courtyard on Jessop Place” that December.
• Why it matters: It is the couple’s base for their first months in the United States, the “Gringolandia” Frida both enjoys and mocks.