McMuseum: The New de Young

The proposed new de Young Museum brings McArchitecture to S.F.

A A A Comments By Joe Fusco Wednesday, Oct 6 1999

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Also sure to be mentioned in every pseudo-news blurbette are Herzog & de Meuron's numerous architectural awards. But architects present awards to each other just for getting out of bed in the morning. Sure, these awards may be self-congratulatory and easy to get, but they are terrific for impressing wannabe building impresarios like the guiding hands of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, an organization that would do well to remember that they don't call architecture "the world's second oldest profession" for nothing.

The little-known, but very well-connected, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco is the puppeteer behind the great show. Though a city agency, it receives 80 percent of its funding from museum benefactors. It picked Herzog & de Meuron, and is pushing the firm for all it is worth. The thinker.org site is well endowed with the firm's hyperbole. Nonconforming opinions in this 20 percent taxpayer-supported site are apparently not welcome, thank you very much.

The new de Young's viewing tower is minimized in the drawing featured on the Fine Arts Web site.

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The New de YoungThe de Young Museum

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The New de Young

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The New de Young

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There are rumors that some of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco's 47 trustees are less than thrilled with the project's museum-as-mall concept, but they are in a difficult position. Like the buyer of any forgery, the more one pays for it, in money and prestige, the less likely one is to doubt its authenticity. The decision-makers have sunk a lot of both into Herzog & de Meuron.

The architects' bicycle deserves a stick in its spokes precisely because they have done so little to reflect the Bay Area's design traditions, offered a floor plan that is unworkable, and learned nothing from the Main Library fiasco. Those who want the de Young to remain a premier museum will appreciate that the Bay Area is supposed to live with this -- Herzog & de Meuron won't have to.

Joe Fusco is a project management consultant who works with private architectural and engineering firms as well as public works departments. A San Francisco native, his efforts to marshal public opposition to the new de Young design include a Web page, www.McMuseum.com.

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