Places We Go : San Francisco's New Furniture Store
Two weeks ago, friends John and Jim and I headed to what I thought was a new furniture store at Pier 70 in San Francisco's historic ship building district in Potrero Hill. The long empty Bethlehem Steel Company administrative building was built in 1917 in the Classic Revival style. RH (previously Restoration Hardware) has completely restored and reimagined refurbished the building and opened their gallery in March. It's five levels and 80,000 square feet of gorgeousness. Right now, it's a jewel in the middle of old warehouses and piers but big plans for housing and shopping are in the future.
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The entrance and the handsome doormen.
Once inside, the quality of craftsmanship was startling. The light fixture in the stair well was Art Decor glamour. I might have been the only one petting the walls of Venetian plaster, smooth as glass. All floors were polished concrete.
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Let's get into the rooms. This one so simple and luxe.
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Each floor has four wings - from the first room, you can see into room after room. Here, a library, dining room, living room and bedroom.
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The formula for each room seemed to be classic yet modern monochromatic furniture, luxe rugs, antiquities and art and glorious lighting.
This chair fit John to a tee. You see that hang tag? It only has a QR code (which your phone can read) but I see online this chair starts at $2096. There are no prices anywhere in the store.
Everyone in the Bay Area knows you aren't supposed to even put a framed picture over your bed in case of earthquake so I'm not sure of the thinking here. But, isn't that a glorious chandelier? And the linens are wonderful. Turns out, the company is the largest importer of Belgian Linen and Italian bedding in the United States
Walking through these rooms, I saw three affordable takeaways. First off, moss scattered around the rooms. I remember bringing moss into my rooms beginning in 1986 as I was newly dating P and, of course, he had to jokingly comment. It was probably used in rooms long before that. Moss is the perfect color green, keeps fresh and works in every room.
A trend that might not last as many years is taking a swipe of paint to a portrait. Over the last year, I've seen this application in rooms on social media and in magazines. At first I thought it was funny, but now it seems just annoying. Maybe RH doesn't actually selling this reproduction as I can't find on their website. RH takes art seriously and has a bevy of artists, including Julian Lennon, selling both reproductions and photography.
A third idea I'm still thinking of two weeks later, is this wall of framed art. I have a blank wall in the living room. I was thinking that I could buy inexpensive IKEA gold or black frames, have mats made and affix small photos on each. I have a ton of black&white family photos and it might be a fun way to display. Any thoughts would be appreciated!
One piece I did fall in love with was an 1800's Italian pine bust with all it's plaster scraped off. It was probably 4' tall and exquisite. I've no idea how much it cost.
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After touring the gallery and seeing photos on social media, it looks like RH is one big photo set to the general public. Besides having a meal in an amazing setting, people were socializing in rooms.
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On the main floor, the spectacular Palm Court seems a place to be seen.
A hamburger is $30 and truffle fries $20. Yikes! Business must be good. RH went public in 2012 at $24 a share. On Friday, it closed at $262.10 with an all-time high of $744 in 2021.
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Maybe best place to hang out is the sunny top floor deck. This photo shows half of it including the Oakland Hills in the background - my house is on the ridge below the yellow X. One of the doormen told us that people schedule spontaneous parties throughout the building and especially on the roof deck.
Another spectacular antiquity, this one outdoors.
photo by john
It's hard to establish the giant size of everything in the galleries. Here's Jim behind a fountain.
I could go on and on but you get the idea. While we took MUNI to get there, we ubered back to the cable car for John and Jim and BART for me. I recommend a field trip as soon as possible.
Note :
There are 18 full-line RH galleries in the US, including Portland, OR.
You can tour the San Francisco RH at https://rh.com/sanfrancisco.
For galleries around the world, check out : https://rh.com/galleries
For catalogs : https://rh.com/customer-service/catalog-request.jsp
top photo : business wire
