Thoroughly Modern Montgomery [Walkng Tour]

Walk Montgomery Street as a living laboratory of modernity, with architecture, film noir, and social-realism murals as modernist responses.
About this Event

This two-hour tour transforms Montgomery Street and Telegraph Hill into a hands-on exploration of how the conditions of modernity have shaped San Francisco since the late nineteenth century. These conditions include finance, mass media, real estate speculation, surveillance, automobiles, and all types of risk, from financial to natural.

You will learn to distinguish between modernity and modernism, which refers to the artistic and architectural expressions that respond to the conditions of modernity.

On this tour, architecture, painting, sculpture, and film tell the story of how Thoroughly Modern Montgomery Street is shaped. You will see how steel-frame towers, glass curtain walls, POPOS, noir films, and social-realist murals reveal the bigger systems at work in our city. By the end of the walk, you will see downtown San Francisco as a place shaped by modernity and reflected by modernism. You will see how modernist styles both celebrate progress, like light, speed, and order, and question its mental, environmental, and social costs.

The tour begins at the One Post Street Plaza and travels up Montgomery Street to Coit Tower. The tour will formally close at the end of Montgomery Street below the Filbert Steps. Participants will receive a handout to interpret the social-realism murals at Coit Tower.

Accessibility: This is a one‑mile outdoor walking tour with an elevation gain of about 200 feet on city sidewalks and paved paths. The route includes some sustained uphill sections and moderate grades that may be challenging for some participants, but we move at a conversational pace and stop regularly to rest and talk. Benches and low seating are available at several points.

Transportation: This tour starts at One Post Street/BART & MUNI Station located at the intersection of Market and Montgomery Streets. It is recommended that you use public transportation or rideshare to reach the starting point. The tour ends at 1360 Montgomery, just below Coit Tower. The 39 Coit Tower Muni bus is the closest public transportation.