Sunnymount Gardens (the City's 2017 report says Sunnymount Garden) is a 60-lot tract on the west side of Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road, recorded in January 1948. A consultant surveyed it for the City in 1997, and the survey forms name Joseph Eichler as its developer. The tract predates the architect-designed houses Eichler built later, and it mixes ranch houses with flat- and butterfly-roofed modern ones. In 2009 the City left it out of its Eichler design guidelines.
This post reads the records: the county's index of recorded maps, the State historic-resource forms prepared for the City in 1997, a 2017 Planning Commission report, and the City's parcel layer. For homes across the city, see our Sunnyvale mid-century modern page.
The recorded map: Tract No. 452
The county's online index of recorded maps lists the tract as "Tract No. 452 Sunnymount Gardents," a spelling slip in the index itself. It was surveyed in October 1947 and recorded on January 6, 1948, in Book 15 at page 25. The index lists four roads: Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road, Bryant Avenue, Sunnymount Avenue and Dee Street. Its note places the land in part of Section 36, Township 6 South, Range 2 West.
The 1997 district record says the district's boundaries match those of that recorded map, a subdivision of 60 lots. Our Eichler Homes company history places this map among the company's other early recorded tracts.
Where it is
The 1997 forms put Sunnymount Gardens just northwest of the corner of Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road and Remington Drive, with Spinosa Drive on the west and Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road on the east. They say the 60 lots front on Dawn Drive, Dee Street and Sunnymount Avenue, and that several lots on the east side abut Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road but can't be reached from it.
The 2017 staff report says the neighborhood "is located north of the Fairbrae Eichler neighborhood," the later tracts covered in our Fairbrae history. It describes the wider area as houses built from the 1940s to the 1960s in a mix of ranch and modern styles, mostly not Eichlers, apart from a few on West Remington Drive near Spinosa Drive.
The land wasn't in Sunnyvale when it was subdivided. The district record says it was annexed to the City in 1949, and the 2017 report gives the same year.
A horseshoe in the orchards
The 1997 forms describe a rectangular tract laid out along a horseshoe-shaped inner loop road. Aerial photographs and maps from the 1950s, the district record says, show it "carved out of orchard lands outside the City boundary." At the time a short central street connected it to Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road on the east; the form says that street "is now closed at that point."
The curved street produced pie-shaped lots, which the form says set the tract apart from the grid plans found elsewhere. It also notes what the tract lacked: curbs, gutters, sidewalks and street trees. It singles out a row of sycamores along the southwest side of Sunnymount Avenue.
Two kinds of houses
The district record describes 60 houses "in both conventional and innovative or 'modern' styles." Almost all are one-story wood-frame houses with attached two-car garages. They sit on slightly raised concrete foundations, with a slab floor only in the garage. The form contrasts that with the concrete slab with radiant heat that later became an integral feature of the Eichler home.
The conventional houses, the form says, lean toward the ranch type:
L-shaped plans with moderately pitched gable or hip roofs;
a front door near the center, facing and visible from the street;
wood-frame double-hung or casement windows with little trim;
siding of horizontal wood shiplap or lapped asbestos-cement shingles, which the form calls a fairly new cladding at the time.
The modern houses follow a fairly uniform plan in three parts: a slightly projecting garage bay, a taller living area, and a recessed porch between them that opens only from inside. The entry sits around the side, at a right angle to the street. Roofs are flat with flat or angled pop-ups, or half-butterfly and full-butterfly forms with deep overhangs. The form lists exposed plank-and-beam ceilings, large areas of glass and clerestory windows in the living area, corner fireplaces in some models, and fixed wood or steel-sash casement windows.
One difference from later Eichlers stands out in the form: the living area faces the street instead of opening onto the rear yard. The form also notes several two-story modern houses along Sunnymount Avenue that "appear to be original, as opposed to later additions," and adds that Eichler's production homes were almost always one story.
The significance statement says "the designer of these homes is unknown," and it reads the modern houses as a transition toward the architect-designed Eichlers that came soon after.
How the modern houses were placed
The 1997 form reads the layout as a deliberate grouping of the modern houses, unlike Sunnyvale Manor, where the two styles were scattered. In its reading:
the houses on axis with the original entry road from Sunnyvale-Saratoga Road were modern;
modern designs ran around the perimeter, apart from some pie-shaped lots built with traditional houses, and filled most of the six lots west of Dee Street;
the inner lots got ranch houses.
"In fact, the modern styles, not the traditional ones dominate in this development," the form says. It adds that alterations, "some quite extensive," have blurred the pattern but not erased it.
The form also compares the tract with Sunnyvale Manor. The Sunnymount houses are larger, on wider lots, with double rather than single garages. The two tracts share many style traits, and a few designs are "virtually identical." Our Sunnyvale Manor history covers that tract.
The 1997 survey: why no district
The 1997 forms, which the City attached to the 2017 report, came from an intensive survey for the City, a follow-up to a 1996 reconnaissance survey; the 2017 report says the work was part of a grant from the State. The district record, dated September 1997, gives the theme as post-war tract housing and the period of significance as 1948–49. It dates construction to 1948–49 from county building permit records and City subdivision records.
The finding was mixed. The consultant documented 34 houses in the tract individually, on Dawn Drive and Sunnymount Avenue, and wrote that they "possess a relatively high degree of integrity." But they were scattered through the tract rather than grouped, and the two house styles lacked visual cohesion. The form concluded that a district made up only of this subdivision would not qualify for the National Register, and suggested exploring a thematic district that would join the modern houses here with those in Sunnyvale Manor (Tract 371).
The form also named seven houses, one on Dawn Drive and six on Sunnymount Avenue, that "appear to be individually eligible for listing in the National Register." We don't print their addresses. That is a 1997 survey opinion, not a listing.
What the City decided
A 2017 Planning Commission report carries the record forward. In 2009, after public review, the City chose design guidelines over historic designation for its Eichler neighborhoods, and Sunnymount Gardens wasn't among the neighborhoods the guidelines cover. Our guide to Sunnyvale's Eichler design guidelines explains what they require where they do apply.
The same report shows what that meant for one house. It reviewed a second-story addition to a flat-roofed modern house on Dawn Drive. The house sat outside the Eichler guidelines, and staff reviewed the project under the City's Single-Family Home Design Techniques. Commission review was needed because the floor area would pass 3,600 square feet. Staff noted that the design kept the house's flat roof, post-and-beam construction and horizontal lines, and the Planning Commission approved it on April 10, 2017.
What the City's parcel layer shows today
The City of Sunnyvale's parcel layer tags 60 parcels with tract number 452, the same number of lots the 1997 forms give. Read on November 8, 2026, it shows:
Streets: 30 parcels on Sunnymount Avenue and 30 on Dawn Drive, by the layer's street field; none on Dee Street or Bryant Avenue. The county index lists Bryant, Dee and Sunnymount but not Dawn, and the 1997 forms list Dawn, Dee and Sunnymount. The records we read don't explain the difference.
Year built: 21 parcels show 1948 and 35 show 1949. One shows 1946, before the 1947 survey and the 1948 recording; the records we read don't explain it. Three show recent years: 2011, 2024 and 2025.
Stories: 53 one-story and 7 two-story.
Zoning: all 60 are R-0, with no combining district, so the layer shows no single-story overlay.
Eichler flag: the City's parcel layer does not flag these parcels as Eichler, though the 1997 district record names Joseph Eichler as the tract's developer.
Planning area: De Anza for all 60.
Before you buy or remodel here
Know which house type you have. The tract mixes ranch and modern houses from the same years and the same developer.
Look under the floor. The forms say these houses sit on slightly raised concrete foundations, not the radiant-heated slab of later Eichlers, so ask your inspector to check the crawl space.
Test the siding before work. The forms name lapped asbestos-cement shingles as one of the original sidings. Our post on the asbestos survey before a remodel covers the air district's rules.
Confirm which rules apply. In 2017 the City reviewed a house here under its Single-Family Home Design Techniques, not the Eichler guidelines. Those rules have since changed, as our design guidelines guide explains, so ask the City's planning staff about your lot.
Pull the permit history. Our guide to checking permit history explains how.
Frequently asked questions
Is Sunnymount Gardens an Eichler tract?
The records tie it to Joseph Eichler. The 1997 forms and the 2017 City report call it one of the two tracts he developed in 1948 and 1949 in what is now Sunnyvale. The forms say the designer of its houses is unknown.
Do Sunnyvale's Eichler design guidelines apply here?
No, according to the 2017 Planning Commission report.
Is it a historic district?
No. The 1997 forms found that the tract as a whole lacked the integrity for a National Register district, and in 2009 the City chose design guidelines over historic designation for its Eichler neighborhoods.
Related reading
Sunnyvale Manor Eichler History: Where the AA-1 Prototype Began
Sunnyvale Eichler Neighborhoods: A Guide to Six Mid-Century Tracts
Sunnyvale Eichler Design Guidelines: What Still Applies in 2026
More guides on this topic: Eichler Neighborhoods & Tract Histories
Want email updates on Eichler homes? Sign up for Eichler Alerts.
Thinking about buying or selling in Sunnymount Gardens or another early Sunnyvale tract? Call or text the Boyenga Team at Compass at (408) 373-1660 or (650) 383-8606, or contact the Boyenga Team online.
