In 1909, Leon Roos married Elizabeth Meyerfield. Leon Roos was a successful businessman; his firm Roos Brothers was a well known clothing establishment in San Francisco. The residence at 3500 Jackson Street was a wedding present to Mrs. Roos from her father, Morris Meyerfield, who had made his fortune in the theater; he owned the Orpheum Theater on Market Street. Meyerfield commissioned Bernard Maybeck to design a residence where his daughter Elizabeth could entertain in a grand manner.

Maybeck created a Tudor style house, terraced into the hillside. He constructed an unusual foundation for the residence, using a lattice of beams fastened to wood piles that were driven into the hillside. It is believed that this experimental design was in response to the 1906 earthquake. Maybeck was trying to create a foundation that would permit movement but still secure the structure to the hillside in the event of a quake.

At first glance, the exterior of the Roos residence appears to be traditional Tudor in style, but closer examination reveals some interesting details. Maybeck carved quatrefoils in the second story balcony as well as under the eaves of the roof. From the street, the horizontal lines of the house are impressive. The house is asymmetrical, divided into two sections: the front section is dedicated to the dining room and the upstairs living quarters, while the back section serves as the living room on the ground level, and the subterranean level functions as a basement. To gain access to the residence, a person has to walk down a covered walkway to the front door, which is situated between the two sections of the house. This off-centered placement of the front door was unusual for the period. Most grand houses had entryways located at the central axis. Maybeck preferred an off-the-street entryway in order to create a transition from the public space of the street to the private interiors of the residence.

Upon entering the house, one is struck by the massive space of the interior. To the left, the dining room offers simple lines of a rectangular room, articulated by lattice windows and redwood paneling. In contrast, the living room (or Great Hall) spans almost the entire length of the house and emphasizes vertical elevation.

The famed architect created a grand house with interesting surprises. Within the entry hall, one reads the wall space as an uninterrupted, solid mass of redwood paneling, but a closer examination reveals openings both to closets and to a guest bathroom. Rather than placing the grand staircase at the center of the living space in a direct line with the front door, Maybeck situated it at the back of the house. This placement emphasizes a separation between the private quarters of the residence and the public space of the lower floors.

The living room is paneled in redwood, punctuated by rose velvet and gold-embossed fleur-de-lys patterns. At the center of the room, a stone fireplace with carved masonry defines the eastern wall. At the northern axis of the room, a large picture window offers a majestic view of the Presidio and Marin County in the distance. Throughout the living room, Gothic elements articulate the space as exhibited in the furniture that Maybeck created for the room as well as in the wall treatments and the ceiling buttresses. He also designed the unusual light fixtures, employing light bulbs as decorative elements.

Maybeck designed sliding doors between the various rooms of the central living spaces. This allowed a reconfiguration of the space to permit large, vertical spaces for entertaining as well as smaller, more intimate rooms for daily living as exemplified by the library, which could serve as an extension to the living room (Great Hall) or could be closed off as a study.

At 9,000 square feet, the Roos residence is one of the largest homes that Maybeck ever designed in the San Francisco Bay Area. He made several additions to the residence, constructing a garden room in 1913 and building a garage in 1916. An upstairs study was added in 1926. The home has continued to be owned and occupied by the Roos family. The original design of the house remains intact, permitting a rare viewing of an architectural masterpiece designed by a legendary Bay Area architect.