Some years ago, San Francisco architect John Maniscalco came across one of those opportunities that demand a certain stamina: an aging two-story house was available for a relative bargain price but required lengthy negotiations with the city’s historic-preservation board in order to overhaul.

Urban dwellings can feel highly compartmentalized, composed of segregated levels.

Brooklyn-based conceptual artist Jill Magid spent years plotting the perfect proposal—the location, the rock, the words—but what she had in mind was a bit different from most.

The 645-foot Millennium Tower—the tallest reinforced concrete structure in the Western United States—is sinking and tilting, and the building owner places the blame squarely on the adjacent Transbay Transit Center project.

How does a startup still feel cozy and cohesive when it has ballooned into an 800-person organization?

Innovation doesn’t always mean employing new technology—it can also mean renewing and refining methods known for centuries.

When it was founded in 1935, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) occupied one, then two floors of the War Memorial Veterans Building in the Hayes Valley neighborhood before moving into its purposebuilt, Mario Botta–designed home in nearby SoMa in 1995.

For a new café, an architect re-engineers the DNA of the California Academy of Sciences next door.