Roadside Attraction: The Beach Chalet, San Francisco

During the Great Depression and for awhile into the postwar period, dedication plaques on public buildings often identified the construction firm simply as "builder" rather than "general contractor".  I like this.  With one word choice, it transports the category of achievement from the dry legal realm to a viscerally physical one.  Imagine being able to point to the Empire State Building (or Rockefeller Center, or one of those big WPA dams) and say, "We built that."  Many of these projects were vast, complex and difficult enough that people died to get them built.  It's fitting that the builders are recognized in print, because sometimes they figured out solutions in the field that evaded architects and engineers in the drafting room.  Today's roadside attraction isn't on that huge scale, but it's a work of art whose very nature commemorates the people who made it. This is the Beach Chalet, a great place to end a cross-country journey or just a jaunt across the city.  Situated at the end of Golden Gate Park, it marks the end of the continent as well, and offers a commanding view of Ocean Beach.

Architect Willis Polk designed the original building in a Spanish Revival style for the City of San Francisco.  Built in 1925, it provided a lounge and changing rooms on the ground level, while the upstairs featured a bar and restaurant.  In a 1936 renovation sponsored by the Works Progress Administration, Lucien Labaudt was commissioned to produce a series of frescoes on the ground floor.  These wrap around the main reception lobby, and provide a view of the life and history of the city which is idealized and stylized so that it conveys a kind of innocence.  Models for many of the figures in these murals were provided by the people working on the renovation and also in city government, and their roles are identified in the plaques spotted at intervals along the walls.

After viewing the murals, you can check out the ground floor gift shop or the Park Chalet, which serves light meals in the space behind the main lobby.  Or you can take the stairs instead of the elevator to the Beach Chalet Brewery and Restaurant upstairs, as this will provide a chance to appreciate the wood railings and balusters with sea creatures carved by Michael von Meyer as part of that 1936 renovation, and the mosaics by Lucien Labaudt and tile craftsman Primo Caredio.

The building served as Coastal Defense HQ for the Army during World War II, and the VFW took it over for a long while after the war, with meeting rooms upstairs and a bar downstairs.  The bar became popular with bikers but not with many neighbors, and the building deteriorated, a process which continued for a few years after the VFW vacated it in '81, the year the Park Service declared it a National Landmark.  Restoration work was finished under a City program in 1989, but the building remained vacant until a 1996 grant from Friends of Recreation and Parks allowed ADA upgrades, and the Truppelli family opened a new craft brewery upstairs behind the bar, with restaurant seating offering spectacular views of windswept Ocean Beach.  Should you make the wise decision to avoid braving the riptides across the Great Highway, you can enjoy a Riptide Red while you watch surf videos on the flat screen over the bar, or linger over dinner while you contemplate the sunset through those big windows to the west.

To get there, set the controls in your driverless Google car to:

The Beach Chalet

1000 The Great Highway

San Francisco, CA 94121

Photo credits:

Top:  Wikipedia
Mural panorama:  matterport.com
3rd (mural):  the author
4th (Stair with railing):  artstheanswer.blogspot.com
5th thru 7th (railing sculpture):  the author
Sunset from 2nd floor:  yelp.com