Asian Art Museum - The Old Main Library

Asian Art Museum - The Old Main Library

Photo: CarmenEsparzaAmoux, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)

A stop on San Francisco, District by District, a free self-guided tour.

On the east side of the plaza, the granite building with tall arched windows was the city's Main Library, designed by George Kelham and opened in 1917 as part of the Civic Center plan.

When the library moved across Fulton Street to a new building in 1996, the old one was converted for the Asian Art Museum, whose collection began with gifts from collector Avery Brundage. Italian architect Gae Aulenti redesigned the interior while keeping the grand staircase and historic halls, and the museum reopened here in 2003. Its collection now holds more than 20,000 objects from across Asia.

Like City Hall, the building was set on base isolators during its conversion to protect it in earthquakes. Check the museum's website for current hours.

More on Wikipedia: Asian Art Museum · Gae Aulenti · George W. Kelham

Stops on this tour

  1. Ferry Building and the Embarcadero - Where the City Met the World
  2. Financial District and Jackson Square - Gold Rush on the Old Shoreline
  3. Chinatown - The Neighborhood That Refused to Move
  4. North Beach and Telegraph Hill - Little Italy and the Beats
  5. Fisherman's Wharf - Italian Boats and Old Ships
  6. Nob Hill and Russian Hill - Cable Cars, Mansions and the Great Fire
  7. The Presidio - Two Centuries Guarding the Golden Gate
  8. Japantown and the Fillmore - Two Communities, One Neighborhood
  9. Haight-Ashbury - From Victorian Suburb to Summer of Love
  10. Golden Gate Park - Sand Dunes Turned Into a Park
  11. The Castro - A Neighborhood That Became a Movement
  12. The Mission - Where San Francisco Began
  13. Civic Center - Domes, Charters and Protest
  14. South of Market - From Rincon Hill to the Tech Boom