Perhaps you have already noticed the larger-than-life sculpture of Father Junipero Serra on a hillside near Hillsborough as you drive north on Highway 280. Father Serra was the Franciscan missionary who established the first 9 missions in Alta (Northern) California from 1769 to 1784 for Spanish King Charles III. Artist Louis Du Bois designed the...Read More
Sir Norman Foster, acclaimed British architect, and his firm, Foster & Partners, are currently juggling multiple commissions in the Bay area. Foster’s success is due in part to his long-term advocacy for technologically advanced buildings that serve the client, while remaining environmentally sensitive. Foster & Partners has proposed two skyscrapers for San Francisco’s Transbay Project...Read More
The Puya Raimondii plant from South America blooms only once in its lifetime, and then it dies. Ordinarily this plant, also called the “Queen of the Andes”, doesn’t bloom until it is 80 -100 years old. Thus, every time this species blooms, it attracts attention. The Bay area has experienced blooming Puya twice in the...Read More
Once upon a time there was a tranquil lily pond in Golden Gate Park. It was just off JFK Drive, near the California Academy of Sciences, and was a pleasant home to ducks and fish, turtles, and frogs. Then someone, or something destroyed that equilibrium. The lily pond became a dumping ground for an invasive amphibian,...Read More
At Walt Disney Family Museum. Walt gave this bronzed hat to his mother for her birthday. He fashioned a heart shape in the crown and filled it with violets. It was cast from one of his favorite hats. Read More
How did the Tasmanian Blue Gum Eucalyptus, a tree from Australia, come to dominate the Bay area landscape? The story begins in the 19th century, soon after the gold rush, when thousands of settlers needed wood to build and fuel the city. At that time, settlers were logging oaks and redwood at an alarming rate....Read More
Happy Isles in Yosemite was the site of a massive rock slide in 1996. Today you can see the remains of the rockfall in boulders, broken trees, and disrupted landscape. One trunk, still standing but broken and hollowed, reminded me of “Spire”, Andy Goldsworthy’s artwork in San Francisco’s Presidio. Spire is a carefully constructed tapered...Read More
In 1769 Spanish explorers mapped a small island at the entrance to San Francisco Bay, and called it Alcatraces after the abundant seabirds sighted there. By 1850, the island sported a defensive fortress, and the Bay’s first lighthouse. As the US military arrived and settled, the birds left, sensing they were no longer welcome. It...Read More
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