The Past is Present in Placerville #3: The Combellack Blair House

Good morning, this is Tina, and I am showing you a beautiful Victorian home which is located at 3059 Cedar Ravine in Placerville, California.

This is a photograph I took while taking a watercolor class at the local college. We went out on location and I discovered I have a very hard time painting out on a sidewalk with people looking over my shoulder. I can't concentrate and everything I do looks awful to me.

I have a good friend who painted the most lovely watercolor of this home in the early 1990s. It was hung in a little clothing store which once was on Placerville Drive. After the store closed, I have always wondered where that painting ended up. I wish I owned it!

I love the pink on this home, it looks like a wedding cake. The home is a fine example of a Queen Anne style, and is now a tan or light brown color. If I remember right, in my lifetime, the home has also been pink, green and blue.

This is a 2009 photograph. This great building has been a bed and breakfast, but I don't believe it is operating right now. The Combellack Blair home was built by William Hill Blair in 1895. It was also home to the Combellack family in later years.
Heidi was gracious enough to share these two photos, above and below, with me so that I could use them in the blog. These were from the 1970s. The two palm trees which once graced the front yard are still in place, and the dark green which was my favorite color for the home is preserved for posterity.

Here is a closer look from Heidi, showing some of the lovely gingerbread trim. I would love to hang out on the second floor balcony and read a good book.

I remember going trick-or-treating a couple of times to this home in the early 1960s, it was thrilling just to go into the foyer and look up the stairs. I also was lucky to go on an old home tour in the 1980s and view the entire home. It was a bed and breakfast at that time.

This is a small wooden block which has been painted to resemble the Combellack Blair home. It is a part of a series of art works by "Sheila" of old homes and historic scenes, mostly of California, I believe.

I am ending with a print from Thomas Kinkade. I have always enjoyed his older paintings of the old homes in Placerville.

Just a short and sweet visit to a great old place. Long may it be present in Placerville!