Palace of fine arts

Palace of Fine Arts
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic district
San Francisco Designated Landmark #88
The Palace of Fine Arts, 2014
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Location	3301 Lyon St., San Francisco, California
Coordinates	37°48′10″N 122°26′54″W / 37.80278°N 122.44833°W / 37.80278; -122.44833Coordinates: 37°48′10″N 122°26′54″W / 37.80278°N 122.44833°W / 37.80278; -122.44833
Area	17 acres (6.9 ha)
Architect	William Gladstone Merchant; Bernard Maybeck
Architectural style	Beaux-Arts
NRHP Reference #	04000659
SFDL #	88
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	December 5, 2005
Designated SFDL	1977

External video

Walkthrough of outside grounds, Virtual Tour

The Palace of Fine Arts in the Marina District of San Francisco, California, is a monumental structure originally constructed for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition in order to exhibit works of art presented there. One of only a few surviving structures from the Exposition, it is still situated on its original site. It was rebuilt in 1965, and renovation of the lagoon, walkways, and a seismic retrofit were completed in early 2009.

In addition to hosting art exhibitions, it remains a popular attraction for tourists and locals and is a favorite location for weddings and wedding party photographs for couples throughout the San Francisco Bay Area and such an icon that a miniature replica of it was built in Disney's California Adventure in Anaheim.

The Palace of Fine Arts was one of ten palaces at the heart of the Panama-Pacific Exhibition, which also included the exhibit palaces of Education, Liberal Arts, Manufactures, Varied Industries, Agriculture, Food Products, Transportation, Mines and Metallurgy and the Palace of Machinery. The Palace of Fine Arts was designed by Bernard Maybeck, who took his inspiration from Roman and Ancient Greek architecture in designing what was essentially a fictional ruin from another time.

While most of the exposition was demolished when the exposition ended, the Palace was so beloved that a Palace Preservation League, founded by Phoebe Apperson Hearst, was founded while the fair was still in progress.

For a time the Palace housed a continuous art exhibit, and during the Great Depression, W.P.A. artists were commissioned to replace the decayed Robert Reid murals on the ceiling of the rotunda. From 1934 to 1942 the exhibition hall was home to eighteen lighted tennis courts. During World War II it was requisitioned by the military for storage of trucks and jeeps. At the end of the war, when the United Nations was created in San Francisco, limousines used by the world's statesmen came from a motor pool there. From 1947 on the hall was put to various uses: as a city Park Department warehouse; as a telephone book distribution center; as a flag and tent storage depot; and even as temporary Fire Department headquarters.