Transamerica Pyramid
- Like Paris' Eiffel Tower, San Francisco's Transamerica Pyramid was not greeted with open arms when developers released plans for the uniquely pointed skyscraper in 1969. Architect William L. Pereira argued that the pyramid shape was ideal for a skyscraper in San Francisco's busy financial district as it allowed extra sunlight into the adjacent streets, but popular opinion was very much against him. Today the Pyramid is, at 853 feet tall, the best known building in the skyline of The City. The outer walls of the pyramid are covered with crushed quartz, making the building look like it is forever bathed in moonlight.
Transbay Center
- It isn't your ordinary train station. The Transbay Transit Center began as a visionary project to create a “Grand Central Station of the West,” set in a neighborhood as new and modern as the transportation hub. The enormous Transit Center connects San Francisco to outlying areas as well as the rest of the state by housing 11 transit systems including Greyhound, AC Transit, Amtrak, BART, SamTrans, Caltrain, Golden Gate Transit, Muni and the High Speed Rail from Los Angeles/Anaheim. The project, designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects, broke ground in 2013. In addition to uniting myriad transit lines in a five-story, steel-and-glass building, the project offers a 5.4-acre rooftop park in downtown San Francisco, designed by PWP Landscape Architecture.
555 California Street
- It entered the world in 1969 as the Bank of America Building, a 52-story skyscraper in The City's financial district, intended to house the home office of the prosperous Bank of America in fit accommodations. The modern structure's thousands of bay windows mirror the bay windows in San Francisco's renowned Victorian buildings. The skyscraper is covered in rich carnelian granite, as is the entire area around it: the nearby plaza and the adjoining sidewalks. In 1998, Bank of America moved its headquarters east and the building became known by its address: 555 California Street.
St. Regis
- San Francisco is not short on deliciously decadent hotels, but the St. Regis stands out in its location on Mission near the Yerba Buena Gardens because it represents a fusion of the old with the new. It is a 42-story skyscraper that neatly incorporated a historic San Francisco structure, the Williams Building, into the tower; the work was completed in 2005. The St. Regis Tower offers guest suites in the five-star St. Regis Hotel as well as 90 luxury condominiums, an underground garage and the Museum of the African Diaspora.
