Charter School Buys YWCA Building in Oakland for $23M

A public charter school has bought the historic YWCA Building designed by Julia Morgan in Downtown Oakland for $22.5 million.

Envision Academy of Arts & Technology, which operated out of the lower three floors of the five-story building, purchased the 67,400-square-foot property at 1515 Webster Street, the San Francisco Business Times reported.

The seller was Highbridge Equity Partners, based in the city. The deal works out to $334 per square foot.

Highbridge bought the YWCA Building, split for commercial and residential, in 2019 for $19.25 million, or $286 per square foot. The firm, which owns eight buildings in Downtown Oakland, including the historic Tribune Tower, listed the former YWCA in 2022 to the highest bidder.

Envision Academy, run by locally based Envision Education, has occupied the YWCA Building for 15 years. The top two floors were leased by Common, a New York-based co-living startup that operated 66 units there. Envision bought both the commercial and residential components.

The academy will continue to take up the three lower floors and use the top two residential floors for teacher housing, according to the Business Times.

The five-story building, built in 1915 for the Young Women’s Christian Association, includes a cornerstone that says, “Dedicated to Nobler Womanhood.”

The Renaissance-style building foreshadowed Morgan’s work on Hearst Castle, the Central Coast home of publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst.

It was designated an Oakland landmark in 1977 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. It contains a two-story atrium, theater, gymnasium and classrooms.

Because of financial troubles, the Oakland YWCA subdivided the building into two parcels in 2000, then later dissolved and left the building by 2007.

The YWCA sold off the top two floors to the California College of Arts and Crafts, which used them as dormitories. It’s not clear when the top floors were sold. Highbridge once had plans to convert the entire property into a 53-room boutique hotel with two restaurants.

The YWCA Building was meticulously restored following damage from the 1992 Loma Prieta earthquake. Original fixtures — from its ornate plaster capitals to its gym floor panels to its lighting, sinks, toilets and radiators — were preserved.

Envision Academy of Arts & Technology is run by Envision Education, a charter school network founded in 2002 by Daniel McLaughlin and Bob Lenz, which operates five schools in the Bay Area, according to its LinkedIn page.

— Dana Bartholomew