SAN FRANCISCO, CA
San Francisco City Hall
San Francisco City Hall is a Beaux-Arts landmark rebuilt after the 1906 earthquake, with one of the tallest civic domes in the United States. Its stone and ornamental metal façade, grand stair hall, and rotunda are frequent case studies in seismic retrofitting, exterior restoration, and historic interior conservation for public buildings.
Phone: (415) 554-4000
Golden Gate Bridge & Welcome Center
The Golden Gate Bridge is an icon of steel suspension engineering, with towers, cables, and concrete anchorages that have undergone continuous coating, corrosion control, and seismic upgrade programs. Contractors and engineers study its maintenance cycles, access systems, and expansion joint design as a model for long-span bridge asset management.
Phone (Welcome Center): (415) 426-5220
Ferry Building
Completed in 1898, the Ferry Building combines a masonry and steel-frame structure with a distinctive clock tower facing the Embarcadero. Its adaptive reuse into a marketplace is a key reference for developers considering shell-and-core upgrades, waterfront resilience, and tenant improvements in historic transit terminals.
Phone: (415) 983-8030
Coit Tower
Coit Tower is a 1933 reinforced-concrete tower on Telegraph Hill, famous for its WPA murals and 360° city views. Its cylindrical concrete shell, interior mural conservation, and hillside foundation conditions make it a useful precedent for vertical additions, hilltop construction, and art-in-place protection.
Phone: (415) 362-0808
Palace of Fine Arts
Originally built for the 1915 Panama–Pacific International Exposition, the Palace of Fine Arts features monumental classical colonnades around a lagoon. The complex has undergone major reconstructions and seismic strengthening, offering lessons in replicating historic ornament, concrete repair, and integrating modern performance spaces into heritage shells.
Phone (Theatre): (415) 563-6504
Transamerica Pyramid Center
The Transamerica Pyramid is a 1972 skyscraper whose tapered concrete-and-steel frame was engineered for seismic performance and wind loads. Its recent repositioning and plaza improvements demonstrate how owners can re-skin ground levels, enhance public realm, and upgrade building systems while preserving a globally recognized silhouette.
Phone (Building management): (415) 829-5400
Grace Cathedral
Grace Cathedral crowns Nob Hill with a Gothic Revival stone exterior, stained glass, and concrete structural frame. For restoration teams, the cathedral’s roof, masonry, and glazing campaigns highlight strategies for waterproofing, seismic bracing, and life-safety upgrades in active houses of worship.
Phone: (415) 749-6300
Asian Art Museum of San Francisco
Housed in the former main library building at Civic Center, the Asian Art Museum blends a historic Beaux-Arts shell with modern galleries and seismic upgrades. Its transformation showcases how designers can insert new structural cores, climate control, and circulation into landmark civic fabric while maintaining a dignified stone façade.
Phone: (415) 581-3500
Mission Dolores (Mission San Francisco de Asís)
Founded in 1776, Mission Dolores includes an adobe chapel and later basilica, making it the city’s oldest surviving structure. Preservation work here focuses on adobe stabilization, wood roof systems, and sensitive upgrades for accessibility, lighting, and visitor circulation in a fragile heritage complex.
Phone: (415) 621-8203
Old San Francisco Mint ("The Granite Lady")
The Old San Francisco Mint is a 19th-century Greek Revival masonry structure that famously survived the 1906 earthquake and fire. Its thick sandstone cladding, granite base, and central courtyard demonstrate historic vault construction and have become a focal point for planning large-scale restoration and adaptive reuse in Central SoMa.
de Young Museum
The de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park is a contemporary copper-clad structure with a perforated skin designed to weather naturally over time. Its seismic base isolation, landscaped plinth, and integration with underground parking make it a key reference for museum design and complex site coordination on soft soils.
Phone: (415) 750-3600
California Academy of Sciences
The California Academy of Sciences is a LEED Platinum museum featuring a living roof, large-span glass, and a hybrid concrete-steel frame. Its envelope combines daylighting, insulation, and green roofing, giving designers a benchmark for high-performance, publicly accessible science facilities in seismic zones.
Conservatory of Flowers
The Conservatory of Flowers is a Victorian-era wood-and-glass greenhouse in Golden Gate Park, one of the oldest structures of its type in the Western Hemisphere. Restoration campaigns here illustrate intricate envelope repair—rebuilding glazed roofs, wood framing, and mechanical systems while preserving historic character in a corrosive fog belt.
Phone: (415) 661-1316
San Francisco Public Library – Main Library
The Main Library at Civic Center is a modern civic building with large reading rooms, atria, and public art integrated into its structure. Its design emphasizes durable finishes, accessible circulation, and flexible interiors, offering a template for municipalities planning next-generation library or community hub projects downtown.
War Memorial Opera House
The War Memorial Opera House is a grand 1932 Beaux-Arts structure that hosts the San Francisco Opera and Ballet. Its stone colonnades, auditorium, and lobby spaces have been seismically upgraded and restored, providing rich precedent for envelope repair, acoustical preservation, and back-of-house modernization in historic performing arts venues.
Phone (Box Office): (415) 864-3330
Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall
Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall is a modern concert hall designed with advanced acoustics and a flexible stage for the San Francisco Symphony. The building’s glass lobby, concrete shell, and acoustic upgrades show how structural and envelope interventions can be phased in active cultural institutions.
Phone (Patron Services): (415) 864-6000
Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture
Fort Mason Center repurposes former military warehouses and piers on the northern waterfront into arts, event, and office spaces. Its long-span structures, concrete piers, and adaptive reuse projects highlight waterfront resilience, envelope repairs under marine exposure, and creative infill for cultural and commercial tenants.
Ghirardelli Square
Ghirardelli Square transforms a historic chocolate factory complex into a mixed-use plaza overlooking the bay. Its brick and timber buildings, seismic strengthening, and public courts offer valuable examples of adaptive reuse, façade rehabilitation, and placemaking in a heritage industrial setting.
Phone (Management Office): (415) 775-5500
Salesforce Transit Center & Rooftop Park
Salesforce Transit Center is a multi-level transit hub with a landscaped rooftop park spanning several city blocks. Its long-span rooftop structure, curtain wall, and integrated transit systems are frequently studied for complex coordination, BIM-driven clash resolution, and public realm design over active infrastructure.
Phone (General inquiries): (415) 984-8626
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA)
SFMOMA combines a distinctive original Mario Botta building with a large Snøhetta-designed expansion, creating a layered envelope of masonry, metal, and glass. Its expanded galleries, vertical circulation, and art-handling cores demonstrate how to stitch new construction into constrained downtown sites while preserving museum operations.
Phone: (415) 357-4000