The Emporium Historic Glass Dome at 835 Market: The Department Store Palace

Why is it significant?

Step inside the grand entrance at 835 Market Street and look up into the breathtaking, ninety-six-foot-wide glass and steel dome of The Emporium.

Key Facts

Open the walk

Step inside the grand entrance at 835 Market Street and look up into the breathtaking, ninety-six-foot-wide glass and steel dome of The Emporium. Opened in May 1896, this magnificent department store was hailed as the grandest retail emporium west of Chicago, complete with a bandstand for an orchestra, an indoor nursery, a barbershop, and a rooftop amusement ground. When the catastrophic 1906 earthquake struck, the steel-framed dome and majestic neoclassical facade survived the violent ground shaking, even as fire gutted the store's interior.

Rebuilt triumphantly in 1908 by architect Albert Pissis, the dome was meticulously restored with gilded ribs and hundreds of translucent glass panes, bathing the marble rotunda in radiant natural light. For almost a century, generations of San Franciscans gathered beneath this dome for holiday festivities, meeting friends 'under the Emporium dome' before shopping. During the 2006 redevelopment of the Westfield San Francisco Centre, engineers performed an extraordinary structural feat: the historic five-hundred-ton dome was jacked up several stories into the air and permanently integrated into a modern retail galleria.

Albert Pissis was one of the first American architects to train at the prestigious École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He introduced Beaux-Arts classical elegance to San Francisco, demonstrating that commercial buildings could possess the monumental dignity of civic temples. The meticulous craftsmanship visible in every historic facade, stone retaining wall, and coastal terrace serves as an enduring testament to the city's extraordinary ability to reinvent itself while honoring its authentic heritage. The meticulous craftsmanship visible in every historic facade, stone retaining wall, and coastal terrace serves as an enduring testament to the city's extraordinary ability to reinvent itself while honoring its authentic heritage.

Look closely at the carved plaster rosettes encircling the dome base; their gilded relief work reflects early twentieth-century California craftsmanship.

Walk west along Market Street for half a block to the corner of Powell Street, arriving before the grand Flood Building.