1881, Alfred Giles. 217 King William St.
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(Photograph by Gerald Moorhead )
This is the smallest of Giles's designs to survive in the area, and it indicates that he was just as creative doing little houses as big ones. The facade of the one-and-a-half-story house presents an illusion, for what appears to be blocks of rock-faced limestone laid with protruding mortar joints is actually executed in stucco, an example of the nineteenth-century's ability to create an expensive-looking finish out of something that costs far less. Trained as a watch repairman in Germany, Sartor opened one of the first jewelry stores in San Antonio.