Category: Chinatown
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Roof Top Plaza
Atop the Chinatown Metro Station There is a small parklet above the Chinatown Metro station. It has lovely views out into the area, as well as serving as a nice respite from the hustle and bustle of the neighborhood. The Chinatown station was designed by Kwan Henmi, now DLR Group, including the rooftop patio,
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Dance by Yumei You
Chinatown Metro station These two metal screen sculptures are massive translations of Yumei Hou’s paper-cutting practice, executed in stainless steel using a laser and painted a vibrant red. “Yangge: Dance of the Bride” and “Yangge: Dance of the New Year” both take their names from the Yangge (Rice Sprout Song) folk dance from the northern…
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A Sense of Community
Chinatown Metro Station This arched ceramic tile mural (14 feet high by 35 feet wide) is one of my favorites of the new BART station art installations. Embedded in this colorful array of tiles are small tiles meant to evoke the cultural exchange of the ancient Silk Road trade route where different fabrics, patterns, and ideas…
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Wentworth Alley Mosaic
Wentworth Alley Chinatown This new mosaic, found on Wentworth Alley off of Washington is titled Dragon Boats Chasing Moonlight and was created by the youth program attached to the Chinatown Community Development Center. The piece was installed in September of 2018 to commemorate the Autumn Moon Festival. The inspiration for the piece stems from an…
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Take Root
Chinatown Public Library 1135 Powell Street Take Root is a set of bi-lingual panels referencing traditional Chinese salutary plaques in contemporary materials of rear-illuminated, die-cut anodized aluminum. The Chinese text is based on calligraphy written for Take Root by well-known artist and calligrapher C. C. Wang. It features a Chinese-American saying about setting roots in…
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Controversial Comfort Women Statue
St. Mary’s Square Chinatown From the moment of installation of this statue by Carmel artist Steven Whyte it has been controversial. The plaque that accompanies the statue reads: This monument bears witness to the suffering of hundreds of thousands of women and girls, euphemistically called “Comfort Women”, who were sexually enslaved by the Japanese Imperial…
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Chinatown Public Library
1135 Powell Street Chinatown The Chinatown Branch of the San Francisco Public Library started its life as the North Beach Branch. It was changed in 1958. Andrew Carnegie left the City of San Francisco, then under Mayor James Phelan, $750,000 for a main library and branches. One half was for the main library and the…
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The First School of California
Portsmouth Square Chinatown This marks the site of the first public school in California. Erected in 1847 Opened April 3, 1848 This commemorative marker was erected in 1957 by the grand lodge of free and accepted masons of the state of California California Historical Landmark 587. The following contemporary account of the little schoolhouse in…
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The Bridge between North Beach and Chinatown
Grant Avenue and Jack Kerouac Alley Chinatown/North Beach This community mural is on the corner of Jack Kerouac Alley and Grant Street. Titled The Bridge, the lead painter was Robert Minervini along with over a dozen local youth from Chinatown. It was sponsored by the Chinatown Community Development Center and the Adopt-An-Alleyway Youth Empowerment Project…
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Pennsylvania Comes to San Francisco
600 California Street Chinatown These two bronze plaques were originally the doors to a hand operated elevator. The doors, designed by Lee O. Lawrie in 1930-1931 were in the Education Building of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Capitol Park in Harrisburg. The sculpture was one of six sets of elevator doors that the artist originally fabricated.…
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Puttin on the Ritz
Ritz Carlton 600 Stockton Street Chinatown Heralded as a “Temple of Commerce” when it opened in September 1909, the massive, 17-columned building spanning Stockton Street between California and Pine Streets, has been expanded five times and is now one of San Francisco’s best examples of neo-classical architecture. The original structure, an 80′ x 80′ white…
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Notre Dame des Victoires Church
566 Bush Street Union Square/Chinatown There are a handful of buildings in San Francisco that turn 100 this year. This will be the beginning of my covering those buildings over the next few weeks. Notre Dame des Victoires is one of the names for the Virgin Mary. This statue of Jesus’ mother is in front…
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Tile and Bronze Column
580 Bush Street Financial District/Union Square/Chinatown This little hidden gem, done in 1992, is a collaboation of Ruth Asawa, her son Paul Lanier and artist Nancy Thompson. Ruth Asawa has been on this website many times before. I recently found this article by Milton Chen and Ruth Cox at Edutopia that gives a few new details…
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Empire Park
600 Block of Commercial Street at Kearny Empire Park Chinatown Empire Park (once called Grabhorn Park) is a POPOS (privately-owned public open space). It is provided and maintained by, The Empire Group, owners of 505 Montgomery Street. The spire perched atop 505 Montgomery is said to be a replica of the Empire State Building, but…
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Chinese in San Francisco
950 Washington Street Chinatown This mural sits on the wall of the Commodore Stockton School. The School has a very rich history. Formed in 1859 it was originally called the Chinese School. It was created for chinese only students as they were not allowed in the public schools. In 1885 the school was renamed the…
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The Home Telephone Building
333 Grant Avenue Chinatown Union Square Ernest Albert Coxhead of Coxhead and Coxhead has given the city of San Francisco many of its finest buildings — one sits at 333 Grant Avenue, San Francisco landmark #141. The Home Telephone Company was San Francisco’s first telephone exchange site. The building, built in 1908 in the Mannerist…
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Guardians of Ping Yuen
711 Pacific Chinatown Ping Yuen Housing Originally 8 terracotta Foo dogs graced this gateway. Chinese guardian lions, known as Shishi or Imperial guardian lion, and often called “Foo Dogs” in the West, are a common representation of the lion in pre-modern China. They have traditionally stood in front of Chinese Imperial palaces, Imperial tombs, government offices, temples, and the homes of government…
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A Heroine is Honored
1199 Mason at Washington Chinatown This is the entry to the Betty Ong Recreation Center in Chinatown. Betty Ann Ong was a flight attendant on American Airlines, Flight 11, the first airplane to become hijacked on September 11, 2001. Shortly after the hijacking began, Betty chose to be involved and make a difference by taking action…
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Willie Woo Woo
Willie Woo Woo Playground Chinatown Sacramento Street and Waverly Place Willie Wong (b:1926,d:2005) was a Chinese-American basketball player who was born and raised in Chinatown, San Francisco. Though Wong was only 5’5″ tall, he excelled, and was known as one of the finest Chinese-American basketball players in the 1940s. He was nicknamed Willie “Woo Woo” Wong by a local sportswriter because…
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Goddess of Democracy
Portsmouth Square Chinatown During China’s 1989 Tianamen Square protests, when hope for sought-after reforms seemed to be fading, artist activists unveiled a 33-ft. tall paper mache and foam sculpture of the “Goddess of Democracy.” The statue, in the tradition of other giant torch-brandishing women, became an icon for the Democratic Movement, though it was…
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Arnold Genthe’s Photography at CCSF Chinatown Campus
Washington and Kearny Chinatown Diligence is the path Up the mountain of knowledge Hard work is the boat Across the endless sea of learning This is the Washington street side of the new Chinatown campus of San Francisco City College. This particular window is the library. The archival photograph is by San Franciscan Arnold Genthe.…
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I Can Cheezburger’s Invisible Bike
Chinatown End of Quincy Street Josh Zubkoff’s Invisible Bike This was taken right after the piece was finished in 2008 This is the image the mural originated from. It is from Ben Hu’s blog I can Cheezburger Josh graduated in 2003 from UC Santa Barbara, with a B.A. in Studio Art. He is presently a system…
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Chinatown’s Gateway Arch
* * * Arguably one of the most photographed sites in San Francisco is the Gateway Arch (Dragon Gate) on Grant Avenue at Bush Street marking the entry to Chinatown, dedicated on October 18th 1970. This gate is the only authentic Chinatown Gate in North America. Unlike similar structures which usually stand on wooden pillars,…
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Chinatown Mural
Chinatown Grant and Sacramento This mural is by Twick of ICP Crew who had a mural in SOMA that has since been painted over and another one around a Banksy in Chinatown. According to his Facebook page: “Twick” is a SF Hip Hop urban legend with many ranks like a general. He is one of the most…
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Broadway Tunnel Art
Chinatown Broadway Tunnel This is the Chinatown side of the Broadway Tunnel. It is dedicated to Robert C. Levy and has a plaque that reads: Robert C. Levy 1921-1985 City and Engineer and superintendent of Building Inspection City and County of San Francisco He devoted his life to high standards of professionalism in engineering and…
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Robert Louis Stevenson in Chinatown
Chinatown Portsmouth Square San Francisco remembers Robert Louis Stevenson with the first monument to Stevenson in the United States. It sits in Portsmouth Square in Chinatown. In 1876 Stevenson was at an art colony in France and fell in love Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne, who was not only married with several children, but was 11 years…
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100 Children
Chinatown 740 Washington Street 100 Children by Leland Wong This mural is part of the Art in Storefronts project sponsored by the San Francisco Arts Commission. Leland Wongs Bai Zi Tu, or 100 children is a traditional Chinese painting, that brings blessing of a complete and healthy family that goes on for generations. Leland, a…
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Portmouth Square Tot Park
Chinatown Portsmouth Square Tot Park Untitled by Mary Fuller McChesney and Robert McChesney In researching the artists I found this 2002 article in the San Francisco Chronicle by M. V. Wood. I loved it so much I thought I would just reproduce it here for all to enjoy. They were hip. They were young and beautiful. And…
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Woh Hei Yuen Park in Chinatown
Chinatown Powell Street Between John and Jackson Streets This is the most wonderful little city park. It is only a half block, but it is such an amazing little retreat. There are benches, green grass and a very small area for children to play. It even has two pieces of public art done in 2000. It…