Slowly, the de Young Museum in front of you is disappearing into the park that surrounds it. The de Young Museum's current building, opened in 2005, was designed by the Swiss firm Herzog and de Meuron with a copper skin that oxidizes over time, shifting from bright orange-gold to the grey-green of weathered copper, until it will eventually blend nearly invisibly into the trees and foliage of Golden Gate Park. The 144-foot observation tower, free to the public, offers one of the best elevated views of the park and the city.
The museum was founded by Michael H. de Young, one of the founders of the San Francisco Chronicle, who assembled art and artifacts from the 1894 California Midwinter International Exposition held in the park and opened them to the public the following year. The original building was damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and after years of debate the city decided to build an entirely new structure rather than repair the old one. The museum's collection encompasses American art from the seventeenth century to the present, with particular strength in American decorative arts and textile arts.
The Hamon observation tower gives you a 360-degree view of the city, the ocean, and on clear days the peninsula south of San Francisco. The tower is free even when the museum is not.