Punahou Circle Apts.

A few photos of the Punahou Circle Apartments tower, in Honolulu at the corner of Beretania and Punahou Streets. I tracked this building down because President Obama lived here as a child. (I realize I'll probably get birther whackaloon trolls for saying that. But hey, that's why Blogger gives me a "Delete Comment" button.) A "Modernism + Recent Past" Google Map by the Historic Hawaii Foundation has this to say about the building:

Childhood home of President Barack Obama (from age 10-18); built by Emma Kwock Chun, who around 1936 became the first Asian to own and develop property in the exclusive Diamond Head area, and one of the first female real estate developers in Hawai‘i. The “Circle” in the building name is an homage to the Waikīkī Circle Hotel, which was developed by Mrs. Kwock Chun in 1962.

Honolulu is home to seemingly countless mid-1960s high rise towers similar to this. The Punahou Circle building has some groovy mid-60s details to it, but before its historic associations came along, it doesn't seem to have been considered an architecturally significant building. Even now, Emporis says almost nothing about it. Now, of course, it will likely be designated a historic landmark someday, thanks to its most famous former resident. For now, though, most of the search results you find for the building are actually apartment rental listings, and the place sounds fairly affordable by Hawaii standards.

One other odd item came up while searching for more info about the building. If you use Google Earth, someone went to the trouble of compiling a KML file of all Magnum P.I. locations around the state. I'm not sure why it came up in the search because the Punahou Circle building doesn't seem to have been used in the show. But I went to the trouble of downloading the file and checking, just in case, and I thought it was kind of fun even though it turned out to be a red herring, so I figured I'd pass it along anyway. So enjoy, or whatever.