There was shock and awe around the Curbed SF HQ at news of a previously unknown Thomas Kincade-branded housing tract in Vallejo. Buried deep within the larger master planned Hiddenbrooke– a golf and residential community heavy on the Anglo-identifiers– it's called "The Village." And while it's easy to be bitchy about the late Thomas Kincade's career as an artist, he apparently didn't have much to do with the residential design and refused to discuss it during his lifetime. The little neighborhood has about a hundred quaintly-detailed houses, tightly packed together like so many Cotswald sardines, secured behind electronic wrought iron gates and the golf course. The houses are awful in the same way as the period pastiches along San Francisco's Portola Drive, or in the flats of Forest Hill— in other words, they'll probably get better with time, if only out of habit. And who knows, maybe some young art historian will resurrect the career of Kincade in 2085. Like the rest Vallejo and Solano County "The Village" suffered badly in the housing crash. At the moment there's only one house available— asking $400,000 and listed this week, a 4-bed, 4-bath house with view of the golf course which sold for $715,000 in 2006.
· Vallejo's Thomas Kinkade community one of a kind [SFGate]
· My Hiddenbrooke [My Hiddenbrooke]
· 4196 Summer Gate Avenue, Vallejo [Redfin]
· Ticky-Tacky Houses From “The Painter of Light™” [Salon]
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