San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Historic building groomed for new use
The unlikely corner of Alameda and Bryant streets in the Mission, close by a Highway 101 overpass, is where you’ll find San Francisco’s most beguiling architectural sleight of hand this year: the conversion of an 1890s powerhouse into a home for animals ranging from pit bulls to chinchillas.
It’s an atmospheric hulk that once held steam engines that powered streetcar lines, with 21-inch-thick brick walls and the occasional grand arched window, the type of old building too easy to take for granted. But the interior that holds the city’s Animal Care & Control agency is entirely new, a
Lead designer Patty Solis , shows daisy-chained water tanks in the basement of the new San Francisco Animal Care & Control center.
three-story insertion that reaffirms a basic truth of cities — some of the best urban structures are the ones flexible enough to live multiple lives.
“We fell in love with the history,” said Patty Solis, a senior architect with the city’s Public Works department. “It has so many layers, and then we built a building within a building.”
In her 10 years with the Bureau of Architecture, Solis has worked on projects ranging from the War Memorial Veterans Building’s restoration to the navigation center for homeless people on the Embarcadero that opened shortly before the pandemic. But this one, a $76 million effort that opened in the spring after six years of planning and construction, may be the most complex yet.
The east wing from 1893 houses a shelter for animals who might have been found on the streets or turned in by owners. The day of my visit there were no shortages of dogs and cats, but also a turtle, several rabbits and a trio of chinchillas.
The west side of the 65,000-square-foot facility is reserved mainly for the agency’s 50 employees, including medical facilities for veterinarians. An enclosed garage and drop-off area for animal control vans was unpleasantly aromatic that morning — one control officer’s first call of the day had been to rescue a chubby skunk that got its head stuck in a fence.
All this had to be incorporated into a masonry shell that was vast but empty, a 44-foothigh space that in recent decades was used by Muni for whatever needs arose. Solis and her team from the Bureau of Architecture found a way to insert two floors inside, plus a third level along Alameda Street that has a vaulted skylight but also is crisscrossed by steel beams added for seismic safety that are only 7 feet above the new concrete floor.
The beams and concrete hint at another element shaping the conversion.
Early on, the city decided that this should be considered an essential civic structure — one that could survive on its own for 72 hours in case of a major earthquake or natural disaster. That’s why there’s a formidable stack of electrical generators in a freestanding structure to the left of where visitors enter the shelter off Bryant Street. Tucked out of sight on the first floor: a long dark space that could be the world’s largest walk-in closet. It looks as though it holds historic boilers. In fact, they are 13 water tanks, each with a capacity of 750 gallons.
At a more fundamental level, the shell had to be made strong enough to withstand whatever hit it. New foot-thick shear walls of concrete were added behind much of the brickwork, though architects left as much of the brickwork exposed along public corridors as they could, to retain elements of the historic feel.
That respect for the past also is why many staff offices are aligned with the wide arched windows. Even if the views are mundane — look at the U-Haul parking lot across the street! — the spatial grandeur is real.
“We tried to give a sense of the original large volumes wherever we could,” Solis said. “That big interior was so beautiful.”
Put it all together, and the hefty-sounding $76 million price tag begins to make sense. It also covers ventilation and cleaning systems to make the setting as humane as possible for the animals. There are play areas on the roof for dogs and small animals such as rabbits, but part of the original wing was carved open to allow an open-air dog run. Above it, an aged brick wall is climbed by two long gently sloping blackmetal staircases; when an elevator had to be deleted from the project to hold down costs, the architects came up with a dog-friendly passage to the rooftop instead.
All this adds up to something much different than the previous shelter a few blocks away, where conditions were decrepit and space was scant. After five months settling in, agency staff can feel the impact.
“It really is life-changing,” suggested Virginia Donohue, executive director of Animal Care & Control. “Happier, healthier pets get adopted quickly.”
“We fell in love with the history. It has so many layers . ... We built a building within a building.”
Patty Solis, architect with S.F. Public Works