This brick-paved triangle with an often-dry fountain awkwardly commemorates the signing of the UN charter in San Francisco. Most days, UN Plaza offers clear views of City Hall, skateboarders attempting fountain flips, Scientologists drumming up converts and the odd drug deal in progress. On the upside, the wonderful Heart of the City Farmers Market brings fresh food to the Tenderloin, and community celebrations like Pride and Tet (Vietnamese lunar new year) bring vibrant local color to otherwise grim UN Plaza.
United Nations Plaza
Downtown, Civic Center & SoMa
Lonely Planet's must-see attractions
3.75 MILES
When Frederick Law Olmsted, architect of New York's Central Park, gazed in 1865 upon the plot of land San Francisco Mayor Frank McCoppin wanted to turn…
1.99 MILES
Was it the fall of 1966 or the winter of ’67? As the Haight saying goes, if you can remember the Summer of Love, you probably weren’t here. The fog was…
1.11 MILES
If you look close today at the clinker-brick buildings lining these narrow backstreets, past the temple balconies jutting out over bakeries, acupuncture…
1.29 MILES
No one could have predicted the cultural force City Lights would become when it first opened in 1953. Sure, it had a proletarian ethos suggested by its…
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
0.8 MILES
When the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art expanded in 2016, it was a mind-boggling feat that nearly tripled the institution's size to accommodate a…
1.62 MILES
If you want to really see San Francisco, head to Coit Tower, a 1933 art deco beaut designed by Arthur Brown, Jr. and Henry Howard that sits high up on…
4.15 MILES
Few cities boast a structure so iconic as the Golden Gate Bridge, commemorated in everything from films like The Maltese Falcon to not one but two emojis…
1.57 MILES
Welcome to San Francisco's sunny side, the land of street ball and Mayan-pyramid playgrounds, semiprofessional tanning and taco picnics. Although the…
Nearby Downtown, Civic Center & SoMa attractions
0.09 MILES
The groundbreaking green design of this government-office building by 2005 Pritzker Architecture Prize winner Thom Mayne means major savings in energy –…
0.13 MILES
A grand light well illuminates SF's favorite subjects: poetry in the Robert Frost Collection, civil rights in the Hormel LGBTQIA Center, SF music zines in…
0.13 MILES
Imaginations race from subtle Chinese ink paintings to seductive Hindu temple carvings and from elegant Islamic calligraphy to cutting-edge Japanese…
0.16 MILES
Get back to your creative roots at this arts nonprofit, which hosts curated shows on themes ranging from garden art to calligraphy made with human-hair…
0.21 MILES
Since 1974, this nonprofit art organization has championed experimental photo-based imagery beyond classic B&W prints and casual digital snapshots. Since…
0.23 MILES
Like a dandelion pushing through sidewalk cracks, this plucky nonprofit gallery has brought signs of life to one of the Tenderloin's toughest blocks for…
0.27 MILES
Market St's traffic-stopping 1937 Mayan deco landmark was built to accommodate 300 wholesale furniture-design showrooms – but, a decade ago, fewer than 30…
8. Compton’s Transgender Cultural District
0.28 MILES
The world's first legally recognized transgender district was created to commemorate historical sites and preserve existing non-profits, businesses and…