Sunset in HD: A Quick Take
Sunset Boulevard, newly resurfaced and surprisingly scenic when the fog lifts, is still a major north–south thoroughfare—one of the few in the city where you can drive with a distant ocean view on clear days. The neighborhood’s famous alphabetical street grid still dominates, but pockets are changing fast. There’s even a night market near Saint Ignatius (SI), and the school itself is expanding.
Across the district, you can feel a shift. The Sunset is maturing, turning over, and picking up steam. There are more three-story homes than you might think—often hiding in plain sight. And while once nearly impossible to get approved, those elusive vertical additions are starting to pop up more often. One renovated home seems to increase the odds for its neighbor. Zoning changes and a friendlier attitude at the Planning Department may be quietly rewriting the skyline.
What’s most striking, though, is this: the Sunset looks crisper. That might sound odd, but there’s a noticeable less-washed-out, more-HD effect going on. Whether it’s because of the fresh asphalt, a citywide paint boom, or simply the number of homes being flipped, modernized, and reimagined—it’s clear. Yes, some blocks still have houses showing decades of deferred maintenance. But increasingly, they’re next to places with bold new color palettes, new numbers, new windows, and new life.
There’s pride here—in the paint jobs, in the landscaping, in the way folks gather outside restaurants and bakeries and on their front stoops. It’s not that the Sunset is losing its low-key character. It’s just starting to feel a little more confident.