Designing San Francisco

A major new urban history of the design and development of postwar San Francisco Designing San Francisco is the untold story of the formative postwar decades when U.S. cities took their modern shape amid clashing visions of the future. In this pathbreaking and richly illustrated book, Alison Isenberg shifts the focus from architects and city planners—those most often hailed in histories of urban development and design—to the unsung artists, activists, and others who played pivotal roles in rebuilding San Francisco between the 1940s and the 1970s. Previous accounts of midcentury urban renewal have focused on the opposing terms set down by Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs—put simply, development versus preservation—and have followed New York City models. Now Isenberg turns our attention west to colorful, pioneering, and contentious San Francisco, where unexpectedly fierce battles were waged over iconic private and public projects like Ghirardelli Square, Golden Gateway, and the Transamerica Pyramid. When large-scale redevelopment came to low-rise San Francisco in the 1950s, the resulting rivalries and conflicts sparked the proliferation of numerous allied arts fields and their professionals, including architectural model makers, real estate publicists, graphic designers, photographers, property managers, builders, sculptors, public-interest lawyers, alternative press writers, and preservationists. Isenberg explores how these centrally engaged arts professionals brought new ideas to city, regional, and national planning and shaped novel projects across urban, suburban, and rural borders. San Francisco’s rebuilding galvanized far-reaching critiques of the inequitable competition for scarce urban land, and propelled debates over responsible public land stewardship. Isenberg challenges many truisms of this renewal era—especially the presumed male domination of postwar urban design, showing how women collaborated in city building long before feminism’s impact in the 1970s. An evocative portrait of one of the world’s great cities, Designing San Francisco provides a new paradigm for understanding past and present struggles to define the urban future.

A major new urban history of the design and development of postwar San Francisco Designing San Francisco is the untold story of the formative postwar decades when U.S. cities took their modern shape amid clashing visions of the future. In this pathbreaking and richly illustrated book, Alison Isenberg shifts the focus from architects and city planners—those most often hailed in histories of urban development and design—to the unsung artists, activists, and others who played pivotal roles in rebuilding San Francisco between the 1940s and the 1970s. Previous accounts of midcentury urban renewal have focused on the opposing terms set down by Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs—put simply, development versus preservation—and have followed New York City models. Now Isenberg turns our attention west to colorful, pioneering, and contentious San Francisco, where unexpectedly fierce battles were waged over iconic private and public projects like Ghirardelli Square, Golden Gateway, and the Transamerica Pyramid. When large-scale redevelopment came to low-rise San Francisco in the 1950s, the resulting rivalries and conflicts sparked the proliferation of numerous allied arts fields and their professionals, including architectural model makers, real estate publicists, graphic designers, photographers, property managers, builders, sculptors, public-interest lawyers, alternative press writers, and preservationists. Isenberg explores how these centrally engaged arts professionals brought new ideas to city, regional, and national planning and shaped novel projects across urban, suburban, and rural borders. San Francisco’s rebuilding galvanized far-reaching critiques of the inequitable competition for scarce urban land, and propelled debates over responsible public land stewardship. Isenberg challenges many truisms of this renewal era—especially the presumed male domination of postwar urban design, showing how women collaborated in city building long before feminism’s impact in the 1970s. An evocative portrait of one of the world’s great cities, Designing San Francisco provides a new paradigm for understanding past and present struggles to define the urban future.

"The Bay area has attracted designers of outstanding stature. Their high standards and creativity are the basis for this book. The vast variety of visual solutions, the broad spectrum of styles, techniques and creative problem solving ideas make this one of the best collections of graphic design available today. Featuring the best San Francisco designers, this assembly exhibits the style, taste and sophistication inherent in this exciting city." "Design portfolios from 32 top design firms are represented in San Francisco:Graphic Design. Some are recognized giants, some are just making their reputations, all of them are first rate. Some of the firms included are Primo Angeli, Cronan Design, Landor Associates, The Office of Michael Manwaring, Pentagram and Michael Schwab. Each provides a statement of purpose and in eight full-color pages exhibit the most current of their design solutions." "Every aspect of graphic design can be found in this volume: annual reports, logos, package design, exhibits, book and editorial design, advertising, signage and corporate identity." "This book inspires and stimulates through the talents of the best San Francisco designers. It gives a very clear idea of the breadth and eclectic nature of San Francisco design."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

San Francisco is known and loved around the world for its iconic man-made structures, such as the Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars, and Transamerica Pyramid. Yet its Civic Center, with the grandest collection of monumental municipal buildings in the United States, is often overlooked, drawing less global and local interest, despite its being an urban planning marvel featuring thirteen government office and cultural buildings. In The San Francisco Civic Center, James Haas tells the complete story of San Francisco’s Civic Center and how it became one of the most complete developments envisioned by any American city. Originally planned and designed by John Galen Howard in 1912, the San Francisco Civic Center is considered in both design and materials one of the finest achievements of the American reformist City Beautiful movement, an urban design movement that began more than a century ago. Haas meticulously unravels the Civic Center’s story of perseverance and dysfunction, providing an understanding and appreciation of this local and national treasure. He discusses why the Civic Center was built, how it became central to the urban planning initiatives of San Francisco in the early twentieth century, and how the site held onto its founders’ vision despite heated public debates about its function and achievement. He also delves into the vision for the future and related national trends in city planning and the architectural and art movements that influenced those trends. Riddled with inspiration and leadership as well as controversy, The San Francisco Civic Center, much like the complex itself, is a stunning manifestation of the confident spirit of one of America’s most dynamic and creative cities.

When Designing Your Life was published in 2016, Stanford’s Bill Burnett and Dave Evans taught readers how to use design thinking to build meaningful, fulfilling lives (“Life has questions. They have answers.” –The New York Times). The book struck a chord, becoming an instant #1 New York Times bestseller. Now, in DESIGNING YOUR WORK LIFE: How to Thrive and Change and Find Happiness at Work they apply that transformative thinking to the place we spend more time than anywhere else: work. DESIGNING YOUR WORK LIFE teaches readers how to create the job they want—without necessarily leaving the job they already have. “Increasingly, it’s up to workers to define their own happiness and success in this ever-moving landscape,” they write, and chapter by chapter, they demonstrate how to build positive change, wherever you are in your career. Whether you want to stay in your job and make it a more meaningful experience, or if you decide it’s time to move on, Evans and Burnett show you how to visualize and build a work-life that is productive, engaged, meaningful, and more fun.

San Francisco, the city of so many people's dreams, is seeing a new wave of architectural innovation every bit the match for the area's stunning landscapes and earlier architectural gems. All of these buildings have been designed to blend seamlessly into the existing urban environment. Quality and authenticity are the keynotes here. Enthusiasts of architecture and art are flocking to see Philippe Starck's Clift Hotel, as well as work by Claudio Silvestrin, Sand Studios, and Gabellini Associates among others. The and: guide San Francisco features the newest and most outstanding buildings. SELLING POINTS -Another of teNeues' authoritative series of pocket guides to recent noteworthy architecture in cities around the world -Includes color photographs and a site map for convenient use by tourist and professionals alike AUTHOR Michelle Galindo lives in Los Angeles and is currently employed by fusion publishing. In spring 2005 she edited the and:guide Chicago (3-8327-9025-X) for teNeues. ILLUSTRATIONS 200 colour photos

A lavishly photographed visual tour of San Francisco's finest architecture and designed spaces.

The corporate downtown, with its multitude of social dilemmas and contradictions, is the focus of this well-illustrated volume. How are downtown projects conceived, scripted, produced, packaged, and used, and how has all this changed during the twentieth century? The authors of Urban Design Downtown offer a critical appraisal of the emerging appearance of downtown urban form. They explore both the poetics of design and the politics and economics of development decisions. Following a historical review of the various phases of downtown transformation, Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris and Tridib Banerjee turn to contemporary American downtowns. They examine the phenomenon of public-space privatization, arguing that corporate open spaces are the consumer-oriented result of policies that have promoted downtown renovation and restructuring but at the same time have neglected the cities' existing poverty-stricken cores. The book's case studies of individual West Coast downtown projects capture the essence of late twentieth-century urbanism. This analysis of downtown urban America, which offers extensive insight into the design and development process, will interest architects, city planners, developers, and urban designers everywhere.