Architect

Frank Mead & Richard Requa

Two black and white portraits. White, middle aged man on left wears round glasses and hat. Young white man on right wears suit and tie.

Frank Mead (l) and Richard Requa (r) | San Diego History Center

Frank Mead (1857-1940) and Richard Requa (1881-1941)

As partners and individual architects, Mead and Requa codified a unique Southern California regional identity that persists today. Mead and Requa had formative experiences with Irving Gill that they translated into a unique aesthetic that blended principles of Modernism with Moorish, Mediterranean, and Pueblo Revival design elements. 

Frank Mead was born in Camden, New Jersey and educated at the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art. Mead first worked for the firm of Frank Miles Day before starting a practice with Charles Barton Keen. During this time, he was introduced to the Saharan Desert Bedouin people, which ignited an interest in vernacular buildings across the Mediterranean. In 1903, Mead moved to San Diego and was hired by William S. Hebbard and Irving J. Gill. Mead worked directly with Gill for several months in 1907 after Hebbard and Gill severed their partnership. While working on the Wheeler Bailey House in La Jolla, Mead became fascinated with southwestern indigenous cultures, particularly the Puebloan peoples, and left the firm to travel to reservations across the west and southwest. 

Richard Requa was born in Illinois and moved to San Diego in 1900. He worked as an electrician before being hired as a building supervisor by Irving Gill in 1907. There, he briefly overlapped with Mead. Requa gained experience as a draftsman under Gill and in 1910 set out to start his own architectural practice. 

In 1912, Mead and Requa began a partnership that would endure until 1923. Their early residential designs are unadorned, geometric volumes that embody Gill’s modernist ethos. However, their work soon began to incorporate Mediterranean and Moorish design elements thanks to Mead’s experience in North Africa. Mead’s influence sparked Requa, too, to travel through North Africa, Central and Southern America, which further developed their unique interpretations of Spanish Colonial Revival, Moorish, Mediterranean, and Pueblo Revival styles. 

The Krotona Court in 1913 was Mead & Requa’s first commission outside of San Diego. Journals like Craftsman took note of the project, helping Mead & Requa achieve name recognition across California and the country. Mead & Requa designed at least one other residence near Krotona, 2117 Vista Del Mar Avenue, for Mr. and Mrs. Augustus F. Knudsen, important financial backers of Krotona.  

Other significant works designed by Mead & Requa include the Hopi House in La Jolla in 1913 (not extant), the Palomar Apartments in San Diego in 1915 (extant), and the Torrey Pines Lodge in San Diego in 1923 (extant). Mead & Requa influence can be seen across Ojai; after a fire burned much of the town in 1917, the firm was hired to rebuild the downtown in a series of cohesive Mission Revival style buildings, including the El Roblar Hotel (extant) and the Ojai Post Office. Mead moved from San Diego to Ojai in 1920, and Mead & Requa’s partnership officially ended in 1923. Information about Mead’s activities and whereabouts from 1923 to his death in 1940 are sparse. 

In 1923, Richard Requa promoted structural engineer Herbert Jackson to partner. In addition to continuing to be a prolific architect, Requa became a significant architectural and civic leader in San Diego. His 1926 book Architectural Details: Spain and the Mediterranean defined and exported his version of Spanish Colonial and Mediterranean Revival style nationally. In 1934, he became Director of the San Diego AIA. From 1935-1936, Requa served as the Director of Architecture for the California Pacific International Exposition held in Balboa Park. His work for Balboa Park is considered the most significant and defining project of his career. Richard Requa is credited with defining “Southern California Architecture” as a distinct style. Both Mead & Requa are City of San Diego-designated master architects.

Related Places

  • Place

    Krotona Court & Grand Temple of the Rosy Cross

    As the headquarters of the American Theosophical Society from 1912-1920, Krotona had a profound impact on the developmen...