Walking San Francisco

The Transcendence sculpture graces the plaza in front of the Bank of America Building.

PUBLIC TRANSIT: Montgomery St. BART station; Muni J, K, L, M, and N trains; F streetcars; 5, 6, 9, 21, 31, and 71 Muni buses

This is where the big wheels turn in San Francisco. Looking much like a short section of midtown Manhattan or the Loop in Chicago, the Financial District is a grid of canyons formed by the high-rise pillars of capitalism. Buildings bold, stately, and conservative tell the secret that lies at the core of San Francisco’s history and character, for while the cultural icons of the city are gold diggers, rainbow-flag wavers, and hippies, it was the staunch businesses of banking, stock brokering, real estate, and shipping that put the city on the map. Suitably, the Financial District resulted from a frantic scramble for well-positioned real estate. During the gold rush, each time valuable bayfront lots were sold, a little more bay was filled, creating new bayfront property.

It’s not particularly comforting to consider that skyscrapers and landfill make for an unhealthy combination in earthquake country, which is why San Francisco’s skyline remained relatively low until quake-resistant steel-frame construction came into vogue. The foundations of the district’s skyscrapers stand on pilings driven deep into the earth, and the more modern towers are designed to sway gently in a temblor. The city’s newest economic titans, tech companies, have taken up shop a few blocks farther south, and we invite you take the SoMa walk to learn more about the changing face, and skyline, of San Francisco’s capitalism.

The Financial District may be cold at heart, but during workdays its sidewalks are alive with fast-paced, smartphone-driven human activity. Restaurants, small museums, public open spaces, and rooftop observatories afford the interloper ample opportunity to see the district from the inside out.

Walk Description

Start at the former

Crocker Bank Building, now owned by Wells Fargo, at 1 Montgomery St. The curved, columned entry makes an effective statement on this prominent corner, but what’s really interesting about the building is that it was once 10 stories taller: it was truncated in the mid-1960s to broaden the views from the Wells Fargo tower behind it. The building’s much-diminished rooftop is an open observatory, so go inside, take the elevator up, and have a look around.

Follow Montgomery to Sutter and turn left. Note the Moroccan Arabic chandelier hanging outside the

Hunter-Dulin Building at 111 Sutter. This 1926 architectural gem, modeled after a French château, has been impeccably restored, and it’s worth a trip into the lobby to admire the hand-painted ceiling, original elevator numbers, and Italian marble floor. According to architectural historian Rick Evans, the cigarette smoke that tarnished the ceiling also ironically served as a sealant to protect it. When it was laboriously and meticulously cleaned, the paint was intact, having been preserved by a protective layer of soot. Also of note is the rounded groove in the middle of the lobby floor—for nearly half a century, an elevator captain would stand in this spot to greet people and direct them to an elevator, and his pivoting eventually wore a gentle divot in the marble. The building’s most famous tenant exists only in literature, as Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade kept his fictional office here in The Maltese Falcon.

Across the street at 130 Sutter is the

Hallidie Building, notable for being among the first glass curtain–wall buildings in the world. Its glass face is supported by a steel frame—a style not at all rare today, but nearly unique in 1917 when it was built. Willis Polk designed it, and it’s named for Andrew Hallidie, the cable car inventor. Note the tastefully curved fire escapes, which enhance the building’s looks as well as provide a way out in the event of a blaze. The Gothic grillwork, restored to its blue-and-gold luster, was chosen to honor the colors of the University of California, Berkeley, which first commissioned the building. Fittingly, the American Institute of Architects now resides inside.

Continue along Kearny and turn right on Claude Lane, a small alley with European flair.

Café Claude is the main draw, with sidewalk tables and the occasional live jazz wafting out. This lane, along with Belden Place, which we will discover shortly, make up the city’s “French Quarter,” and indeed in 1851 more than 3,000 French immigrants settled in the area, bringing with them their bistros, religious masses, and savoir faire, much of which remains.

At Bush, turn right. At the corner of Belden and Bush,

Sam’s Grill is a neighborhood institution with a traditional San Francisco menu based on seafood, pasta, and sourdough bread. The interior booths have curtains, for the privacy of patrons who need to hash out a shady deal, and black-tie waiters stand at the ready to bring you a martini. Everything about the place oozes old-school San Francisco and high-stakes deals.

Head up Belden, another pedestrian alley lined with sidewalk restaurants. During lunch and dinner hours, especially on warm days, the alley is crammed with little tables where off-duty white-collar workers enjoy mussels from

Plouf or steak frites from

Cafe Bastille. And on Bastille Day, July 14, the entire block is crammed with hundreds of Francophiles under the twinkling lights.

At the end of Belden Place, hook left and continue down Kearny, walking in the shadow of the

Bank of America Building, which stands 52 stories tall and was San Francisco’s tallest building until the Transamerica Pyramid went up a few years later. Look up from any perspective, and the building’s striking sawtooth bays, slicing into the sky, catch and reflect light and color. Wide steps meet a raised plaza with a hulking black sculpture by the late Masayuki Nagare, officially called Transcendence but broadly referred to as “Banker’s Heart.”

Follow Kearny to Sacramento, turn right, and turn right again at Montgomery. The

Wells Fargo History Museum is worth a quick stop to get a rosy perspective on one of the city’s biggest and oldest financial institutions. (Wells Fargo opened its first office in San Francisco in 1852.) It won’t require more than a few minutes to take an up-close look at the museum’s old stagecoach. There’s actually quite a good bit of interesting gold rush history on both the ground and second floor, including goofy opportunities to “meet” a stagecoach driver or take your picture beside one. In addition to banking, Wells Fargo initially ran a network of stages across the Western United States until the arrival of the railroads. Admission to the museum is free.

At the corner of Montgomery and California, the geographic epicenter of the Financial District, turn right. Built in 1903, the

Merchants Exchange Club (465 California St.) was designed by Daniel Burnham and reflects his Chicago School architectural style. Enter the building and pass through the long lobby, adorned with the ceramic sculptures of San Francisco’s founders. Artist Mark Jaeger made the works, and you’ll recognize all the greats for whom the streets we’re walking are named. Continuing, you will enter the California Bank Trust, where the glory of the building’s maritime past is celebrated with huge murals by Walter Coulter and Nils Hagerup. Willis Polk tapped architect Julia Morgan to help with post-earthquake renovation and design, and she kept her offices on the top floor of the building. Morgan was the first licensed female architect in California, and the grand 15th-floor ballroom is named for her.

Exit a side door onto tiny Leidesdorff Street, a narrow lane that appears determined not to attract attention. Before the 1906 quake, Leidesdorff was known as Pauper Alley. As wild speculation on silver mining went on elsewhere in the district, Leidesdorff was lined with small-time exchanges where the nearly penniless could invest a few cents in hopes of turning their luck around. The street apparently had few, if any, rags-to-riches tales.

Return to California Street, and opposite, on the corner of Sansome, you’ll spot the imposing

Bank of California Building, a mausoleum-like structure erected in 1908. Step inside and you’ll see that the entire building is, essentially, one huge, cavernous room with enough airspace beneath its vaulted ceiling to fly a small airplane, if such a thing were permitted. It’s a glorious waste of space for such a high-rent district. Down in the basement, a small museum (free admission) has a few intriguing items, including gold nuggets embedded in chunks of quartz, and some territorial gold coins and shiny ingots from the gold rush.

European-flavored Belden Place is home to celebrated sidewalk cafés and restaurants.

Turn right at Sansome and right again at Pine. On the opposite corner is the former

Pacific Coast Stock Exchange. Stockbrokers used to work here, and now that it’s an Equinox fitness club, they work out here. The building dates from 1915, and apparently the stock market crash necessitated a 1930 remodeling job, with designs by Timothy Pflueger. The stoic sculpted figures on both sides of the broad front stairway are by Ralph Stackpole, who in the early 20th century was a central figure in the city’s art scene. A side entrance on Sansome leads to the private

City Club of San Francisco, in which a two-story mural by Diego Rivera graces a stairwell, which can be viewed by nonmembers on a guided tour (see sfcityguides.org for more information). Rivera was commissioned by his friend Stackpole, and the decision was not without controversy: many worried that Rivera’s politically liberal leanings stood in contrast to this iconic building of capitalism. Their concern was for naught, as the brilliant fresco, Rivera’s first in the United States, became a lauded symbol of the City Club.

A replica of Stirling Calder’s Star Girl shines in the Citigroup Center atrium.

Turn left at Montgomery, onto a block dominated by two handsome landmarks. The neo-Gothic

Russ Building, at No. 235, was the city’s tallest structure for several decades after it was built in 1928. It also boasts the city’s first indoor parking garage. Opposite, at No. 220, the

Mills Building is the city’s archetypal Chicago-style office building. A Daniel Burnham–John Wellborn Root collaboration that was the first all-steel-frame structure in the city, it was built in 1892 and survived the 1906 catastrophe, though extensive renovation was required.

At Sutter turn left. At the corner of Sutter and Sansome is what remains of the Anglo and London Paris National Bank, which was built in 1910 and gutted in 1984, reducing it to an atrium for the adjacent Citigroup Center. The atrium is open to the public during business hours. Inside, beyond the café tables and fountain, you’ll spot

Star Girl, a replica of a sculpture by Stirling Calder for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, which took place in the Marina District in 1915.

Turn left onto Market Street, and to your left is the green-tinted

Crown Zellerbach Building, a glass-curtain beauty from 1959. Unlike nearly every other building in the cramped Financial District, the Crown Zellerbach is set off the street with paved grounds surrounding it, a groundbreaking design decision at the time. It was the first tower of distinction to go up following the Great Depression, and it ushered in midcentury architecture quite distinct from the stone masonry giants surrounding it. The main entrance faces Bush, not Market, and the glass lobby is notable for its appearance of floating between the columns.

Turn left at Battery and left again at Bush, where two contrasting structures stand side by side. The elegant

Shell Building, at 100 Bush, is a sleek Art Deco skyscraper clad in terra-cotta, with decorative ornamentation of gushing oil derricks that reflects its original owner. Completed right before the Wall Street Crash of 1929, this was the last Art Deco building built in San Francisco, as the Great Depression halted new construction. It dwarfs its neighbor, the pencil-thin

Heineman Building, at 130 Bush. Designed by George Applegarth and built in 1910, the Gothic revival Heineman Building makes the fullest use of its slender, 20-foot lot. The skinny building also purposely pays homage to its original occupant, as it was once a belt, tie, and suspender factory. Its bay facade protrudes beyond the plane of the adjacent buildings, and its cornice actually overlaps them.

The venerable Tadich Grill has been serving its weekly seafood specials since 1849.

Return to Battery, and turn left and then right onto California Street. At 240 California St., half a block off Battery,

Tadich Grill is a revered San Francisco dining establishment. Opened in 1849, it’s the oldest continuously operating restaurant in the city, and the first to introduce the Croatian style of grilling fish over mesquite charcoal. It has occupied its present site since the late 1960s but has the atmosphere of the original—the previous location, on Clay Street, was stripped, moved, and reassembled here. Busy as ever, Tadich hasn’t changed its weekly specials in decades, and it continues to draw hundreds of people daily for sand dabs, oysters, and Dungeness crab cakes.

At Front Street turn left and pass

Schroeder’s Restaurant, a Bavarian beer hall that’s been operating in one form or another since 1893. The original building on Market was destroyed in the 1906 quake but rose from the ashes at this location shortly thereafter. The restaurant has changed with the times (it began welcoming women in the 1970s) but has remained true to its German roots in the menu and occasional polka band.

Next head into the

Embarcadero Center. This four-tower complex, with a shopping center on the bottom two floors and offices above, was loosely modeled on New York’s Rockefeller Center. Walk up the winding stairs to the second level, and follow the footbridge that crosses over Battery Street. As you cross you’ll get a good vantage of the

Old Federal Reserve Building, an imposing neoclassical structure built in 1924. If you enter on Sansome Street, you can walk through the lobby, graced by a Jules Guerin mural of Italian shipping merchants created for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.

Follow Clay Street to Montgomery and the

Transamerica Pyramid. At 853 feet, it was the tallest building in San Francisco for 46 years until the Salesforce Tower took over that mantle in 2018. After it was completed in 1972, it was unpopular, mostly for being so conspicuous, but today it’s difficult to imagine San Francisco’s skyline without the pyramid’s pointed top. The design is functional as well, as the sloped walls allow a lot of interior light without casting a shadow on neighboring buildings. Note the entrance to Transamerica Redwood Park, where 80 mature redwoods from the Santa Cruz Mountains were transplanted. As you relax in the shade, take a moment to consider that if you were sitting here in the early 1800s, the water would have been lapping at your feet. The site where the pyramid sits is essentially the former waterfront line before the shallow Yerba Buena Cove was filled in (often with abandoned tall ships) to accommodate the popularity surge during the gold rush.

Points of Interest

Crocker Bank Building (former) 1 Montgomery St. (no published phone number or website)

Hunter-Dulin Building 111 Sutter St. (no published phone number or website)

Hallidie Building 130 Sutter St. (no published phone number or website)

Café Claude 7 Claude Lane; 415-392-3505, cafeclaude.com

Sam’s Grill 374 Bush St.; 415-421-0594, samsgrillsf.com

Plouf 40 Belden Place; 415-986-6491, ploufsf.com

Cafe Bastille 22 Belden Place; 415-986-5673, cafebastille.com

Bank of America Building 555 California St.; 415-392-1697, 555californiastreet.info

Wells Fargo History Museum 420 Montgomery St.; 415-396-2619, wellsfargohistory.com

Merchants Exchange Club 465 California St.; 415-591-1833, mxclubsf.com

Bank of California Building (former) 400 California St.; 415-986-5002, tinyurl.com/400california

Pacific Coast Stock Exchange/Equinox 301 Pine St.; 415-593-4000, tinyurl.com/equinoxpine

The City Club of San Francisco 155 Sansome St.; 415-362-2480, cityclubsf.com

Russ Building 235 Montgomery St.; russbldg.com (no public-facing phone number)

Mills Building 220 Bush St.; themillsbuilding.com (no public-facing phone number)

Star Girl Sculpture 1 Sansome St.

Crown Zellerbach Building 1 Bush Plaza; 415-536-1850, tishmanspeyer.com

Shell Building 100 Bush St.; 415-986-8880, shellbuildingsf.com

Heineman Building 130 Bush St. (no published phone number or website)

Tadich Grill 240 California St.; 415-391-1849, tadichgrillsf.com

Schroeder’s Restaurant 240 Front St.; 415-421-4778, schroederssf.com

Embarcadero Center Bordered by Sacramento, Battery, Clay, and Drumm Sts.; 415-772-0700, embarcaderocenter.com

Bently Reserve (Old Federal Reserve Building) 301 Battery St.; 415-294-2226, bentlyreserve.com

Transamerica Pyramid and Redwood Park 600 Montgomery St.; pyramidcenter.com (no public-facing phone number)