08/12/2016 King and queen will forever reign over S.F.

s downtown - San Francisco Chronicle

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King and queen will forever reign

over S.F.s downtown
By John King | December 8, 2016 | Updated: October 1, 2015 11:25am

Photo: Andrea Ponsi, University Of Virginia Press

A sketch by Andrea Ponsi from San Francisco: A Map of Perceptions, courtesy of the University of Virginia Press.

Like many European visitors to San Francisco, Andrea Ponsi is enamored with the cultural
touchstones of our citys northeast corner: City Lights, Marios Bohemian Cigar Store Cafe,
Chinatown with its walls of voices.

But on a recent visit to this place where he lived more than 20 years ago, the Italian architect
paused to contemplate something less intimate: an 853-foot shaft at the edge of the Financial
District.
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08/12/2016 King and queen will forever reign over S.F.s downtown - San Francisco Chronicle

Take one pyramid, Egyptian is ne.

Grasp its top with your thumb and MOREBYJOHNKING
forenger. Then pull up, stretching the
Veterans Building
point as if it were a piece of very elastic restoration defers to
rubber. ... Prick it with dozens of windows original vision

all alike. Then add two ears: the concrete

elevator shafts, writes Ponsi in San Vision for future needs to
Francisco: A Map of Perceptions, account for the rising
waters all
published earlier this year by University of
Virginia Press. There you have it: You
have made the Transamerica Pyramid, the S.F.s residential towers
most recognizable building in the city. encase tenants in urban
luxury

This take on the pointed high-rise from

1972 hints at the avor of Ponsis Architecture festival
beguiling yet sharply focused features dozens of top-
notch events
contemplation of the physical, atmospheric
and architectural factors that make this
peninsula unique. Beyond that, the easy
tone about a real icon, and not a bad one
at that conveys how a structure that should be so startling has become a comfortable, even
reassuring piece of the landscape.

That fate wouldnt have been predicted by the critics near and far who chimed in that such a
tower at the corner of Columbus Avenue and Washington Street would be like, in the words
of Progressive Architecture, destroying Grand Canyon. Nor is the brainchild of architect
William Pereira the sort of pyrotechnic wonder that looks super cool and then mighty lame.

Instead, 43 years on, downtowns tallest tower exists outside the fray, as settled in its own
way as Jackson Square to the north or Chinatown to the west. The recessive shape, the deep
monotony of the windows, the odd way it touches the ground all those elements contribute
to the paradox of a low-key high-rise.

Lift everything up and place it on a small forest of intertwining pillars, Ponsi writes
acceptingly. Now take this building and drop it from above into the center of town right at
the foot of Columbus Avenue.

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08/12/2016 King and queen will forever reign over S.F.s downtown - San Francisco Chronicle

Photo: Andrea Ponsi, University Of Virginia Press

IMAGE 1 OF 3
Andrea Ponsis sketch from A Map of Perceptions looks down Russian Hill, up Telegraph Hill to Coit Tower.

That phrase center of town conveys Ponsis city view and indeed, the view of the city
that persisted into the 1990s. When Ponsi returns on a visit he returns to his spots that evoke
memories, like the tight-packed sanctuary of William Stout Architectural Books. Or Marios,
where he laments the absence of the pinball machine and holding my little boy up, his tiny
hands on the buttons to shoot the balls. The blocks and districts beyond are vivid fragments,
such as this summation of the Tenderloin: It can call forth repugnance, pity or an urge for
social justice.

But the whole is the sum of the parts, and Ponsis awareness of this keeps him from falling
into the trap of so many San Franciscans who recoil at change. One stream of vignettes in this
shifting river involves a journey to Golden Gate Gate Park, where the pairing of the de Young
Museum and the California Academy of Sciences strikes him as just right: the latter a poised
machine, the former a geological block, a biological body, a metal animal.

The Transamerica Pyramid, meanwhile, pops out from Ponsis sketches as an orientation
point, a pivot for the city around it. Recessive yet with a personality, genteel, but also daring
and brave.

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08/12/2016 King and queen will forever reign over S.F.s downtown - San Francisco Chronicle

The latter description comes when Ponsi likens Pereiras shaft and the nearby Bank of
America Building from 1969 now known by its address, 555 California St. as still the
king and queen reigning, unchallenged, over downtown.

Certainly thats the case from North

Beach or Telegraph Hill, each with a
full-on view of these twin constructed
peaks. But will this remain true as the
blocks south of Market Street ll in yet
more? At least three high-rises in the
works will pass the 779-foot summit of
555 California St.; one, the Salesforce
Tower at First and Mission, will top off
at 1,070 feet.

My guess is that Ponsis verdict will

hold.

While the towers sprouting on Rincon

Hill and in the Transbay district vary in
quality, they seem bound by the urge to Photo: Andrea Ponsi, University Of
Virginia Press
live in the moment. Shimmers of sleek,
eager to radiate Now. And there are a lot
The cover of "San Francisco: A Map of Perceptions,"
of them. a book of prose and sketches by Andrea Posni,
courtesy of the University of Virginia Press.

But the pyramid and the old Bank of

America with its faceted carnelian
granite bays will continue to stand alone, in part because the citys resistance to high-rises in
the 1970s and 80s prodded politicians and planners to steer future towers away from the
older neighborhoods that Ponsi cherishes. More than that, they feel rooted the pyramid
with that forest at its base, 555 California with its sunset-friendly skin.

San Francisco: A Map of Perceptions accepts that the terrain around us continues to shift. It
also grasps that a focus on change obscures what endures and why the next crop of
newcomers will fall in love once again.

Place is a weekly column by John King, The Chronicles urban design critic. E-mail:
jking@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @johnkingsfchron

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08/12/2016 King and queen will forever reign over S.F.s downtown - San Francisco Chronicle

John King
Architecture Critic

2016 Hearst Corporation

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