San Francisco: A Map of Perceptions

San Francisco is a city designed for artists and wanderers. From North
Beach, to Chinatown, to the cold, rough surf of Ocean Beach, to Marin, both visitors and lifelong
residents have endless opportunities to explore new neighborhoods, buildings, environments, and
cultures just by getting in the car, hopping on a cable car, or by simply walking around the block.

In San Francisco: A Map of Perceptions, the architect Andrea
Ponsi unravels the multifaceted beauty of one of America’s favorite cities, introducing even
those who have lived there for years to nuances often left unseen. Ponsi, a native of Florence who
lived in San Francisco for many years, lyrically describes everyday life in the city, from a
café in North Beach where he sits next to Lawrence Ferlinghetti, to the de Young Museum
("a solid mass, a rough but elegant body, faceted but compact") and the Academy of
Sciences ("an ethereal, transparent building, lace made of glass and slender columns"), to
Alcatraz ("an abandoned ship, a Flying Dutchman set adrift that bears the signs of a life of
torment"), and even to the buffalo who reside in Golden Gate Park.

As with
his book on Florence, Ponsi here reveals a deeply personal look at what it’s like to live in
and love a city. Having the unique perspective of having been both an insider and an outsider to San
Francisco, he speaks to us in the way we dream an architect would, capturing the city’s
diverse yet emblematic structures through delicate watercolor and line drawings, while also offering
poetic descriptions of the underlying smells, sounds, and light of its many
neighborhoods.

A perfect balance of text and illustrations, San
Francisco: A Map of Perceptions offers not only a guide for those visiting or returning to
the city but also a compelling invitation for residents to revisit the utterly unique place in which
they live.