Thursday, January 02, 2014

Reflections on Buildings



The glass facade of the SFJAZZ Center reflects the building across Franklin Street which is festooned with photo blow-ups of old jazz stars, setting up a visual echo.



A block away, the transformation of 100 Van Ness from an office skyscraper to a luxury rental building continues...



...and the new glass facade for the building is currently being installed upwards from the bottom floors.



Further north on Van Ness and Geary, the old Jack Tar/Cathedral Hill Hotel is being carefully dismantled to make way for the new Sutter Health hospital complex. The hotel's major claims to fame in my mind was being the site for the central murder in Coppola's 1970s film The Conversation and also hosting Werner Erhard's early EST seminars in the same decade.



The newly rehabbed 50 United Nations Plaza building on McAllister Street continues to improve the neighborhood as it reflects light magically...



...while the new hole in the ground at nearby Market Street between 5th and 6th allows for even more light-filled sky which will probably soon be obliterated by another large development.

4 comments:

  1. I will shed no tears for the Jack Tar Hotel.

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  2. Dear Hattie: I won't be missing the Jack Tar either.

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  3. I remember rather happily a picket line that encircled the Jack Tar one time when Ferdinand Marcos came to town ... Good riddance to both.

    Your area is a great one for reflections as I've discovered when I photograph precincts down there. :-)

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  4. Dear Jan: Werner Ehard and Ferdinand Marcos working the same strange hotel? Do you remember the decade for the picket line? It would make for an interesting play/movie, combining the strangeness of an EST training and an anti-Marcos demonstration at the same time.

    And yes, my neighborhood is turning into glass sheathed edifices, which might make for some serious nastiness during the next big shaker.

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