The old Vortex Room was tucked away in a nondescript building without any signs and barely an address at 1082 Howard Street. But the proposed nine-story building to rise on the site, with eight full-floor condos designed by Natoma Architects, would be a little less discreet and easier to find. At least until the rest of the SoMa block, which is zoned for 85-feet in height, develops.
As designed, the building doesn’t feature a garage or parking (the lower two floors are a single unit with a private rear yard), but there are built-in shutters for privacy, shading and aesthetics.
Losing Vortex room was so unfortunate, there’s just nothing like it now. Roxie shows documentaries and art films, where is there anywhere now to see grind house and obscure movies in a psychedelic theater where people dress bizarrely, strong drinks are sold, and people smoke pot and crack jokes during the film?
The guy who started it is supposedly opening a replacement on Mission st, but it seems to be in limbo at this point. The first time I went to the Vortex man, I just felt like, man this is San Francisco.
The Alamo on Mission will def show some weird movies, but I’m not sure I share your nostalgia for smoking indoors. The New Parkway in Oakland has some funk to it as well. 🙂
Alamo will show cool movies, but it won’t show Vortex movies. The owner has an absurdly large collection of film, I mean actual film, he uses real projectors
vortex wasn’t just an undergroundish repertory cinema, it was a borderline hotel/borderline bar. place was so so great, very much “old” sf.
still, if those guys were forced out, let them build tall. though it’s sort of weird that it’ll be a ~$1.5 million bottom floor unit.
Expect all sorts of objections about it being “too tall” and “out of character” but progress has to start somewhere and turning central neighborhoods from 1 and 2 floors to 9 is what has to happen if we will ever relieve the housing shortage.
Agreed. West/Central SoMa is the area that needs to be razed in favor of tall buildings. It’s urban, ripe for density (with freeways and caltrans all around), and tall buildings in that area won’t ‘cast shadows’ on any parks.
A decade ago, we faced a choice. Take SOMA and the 3rd St corridor all the way to Bayview and create a city within the City, a dense urban neighborhood unlike anything else on the west coast. We didn’t do it because too many people wanted to “preserve the real SF”. And now, we’re well on our way to destroying all of real SF instead.
The miniature highway like streets of Soma and the industrial buildings are not the “real SF” and don’t need to be preserved. That stuff isn’t on any postcards. They could make those wide Soma streets into dual direction tree lined boulevards or ramblas with grand buildings on both sides. I’ve never understood the sentimental attachment to such a gritty neighborhood. Let’s get some city planning and vision in here! So much potential.
I didn’t mean that area was the “real SF”. But a lot of people seem to think that just stopping more housing and tall buildings in the one area of the City that could accommodate them will magically preserve the various neighborhood vibes all over town. I guess by example or osmosis or something.
I’m with BTinSF…
And if it were developed like an urban center versus a suburb it would demand more transit investment.
Very much lower east side circa ten years ago.
We will see if this can raise the tone of the south of the slot mud. Hope it has excellent foundation.
Now this is the type of infill I love. More please!
i live in this neighborhood (18yrs). i would love to see 200′ or more going up around me. but i don’t care for this design. those window recesses look uncomfortably deep. maybe it’s just bad perspective? i mean, what’s that guy looking at? a wall?
You’ve got a point there. It would make more sense if those were mini-balconies. I’d say “at least they can use them for potted plants”, but then it seems like a safety hazard to allow pots on a ledge 50 feet above the street.
He’s looking at this morning’s pigeon droppings on his “balcony”.
It’s very Hollywood Squares meets Amsterdam bordello. Is the sexy dude drinking wine or vaping?
A nice Saitowitz design. Why not make the recessed areas balconies?
Very awkward recessed windows. How wide will be this building? 25feet?
I feel like you’ll be losing a lot of light, as well as a ton of view. When you look out the window, you will only see what’s across and only a bit on the sides. I hope what’s right across is interesting enough, because that’s basically all you’ll be allowed see.
Wanna see if your friends’ car is still parked at the corner? Nope. Else you have a stick with a mirror like the elderly in Italian villages.
24.583′ according to the assessor’s map.
The building reminds me of Kalach’s Reforma 27 in Mexico City. http://www.archdaily.com/271968/reforma-27-alberto-kalach
At first glance, this looks like a good foil for the existing low-grade structures around it.
As a long time West SoMa owner, I would love to see all the short, uninteresting buildings replaced with high quality, high density towers. However, windows inset like those shown here severely restrict peripheral views, and allow unreachable filth to gather outside. This is clearly a conceit of the architect to provide depth and texture to the surface of an otherwise potentially bland box.
Tragically, when architectural form leads function, it becomes at best a flash-in-the-pan. Maybe blue glass could provide the desired contrast instead of these unfortunate deep-set 2×2 alcoves outside every window?
So Nice.
Lets make it 15 stories!
Build 20 stories, but when you do, check the transit improvement fee’s for the area… Lacking severely in terms of improvements….
Looks like a great building to hang out on if you’re a pigeon
Rock doves! They should thank humans for providing them with so much habitat.
Sliver buildings like this belong all over SF.
And it won’t contribute a fraction of the culture and character to San Francisco that the Vortex Room did.
I’d like to think that the spirits of some of the Vortex’s more outré cinematic showings will haunt it’s corridors.
As a person who lived above the Vortex I can say some of those buildings I looked at across the street were quite fabulous which included art deco, Italian renaissance, beaux art etc. with plaster and tile work and an incredible doorway in a building once created for the blind. Most were once industrial and some of them were converted to apartments and lofts. Most of them have a number of stories suitable for housing. None of them need to be knocked down.