Photo by Brocken Inaglory on Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 3.0

The Cliff House closed its doors in 2020, leaving many Bay Area residents wondering what would happen to the iconic restaurant and space. After several years of uncertainty, the National Parks Service announced that a 20-year lease was awarded to Sutro Lands End Partners LLC. The space is expected to open sometime in 2024, and details about the new restaurant have yet to be released.

The Cliff House closed in 2020, citing the pandemic and the federal government stalling their lease. The closure followed another iconic restaurant in the area, Louis’, announcing it was closing its doors.

Cliff House history

Perched on the rugged cliffs at Lands End, the Cliff House has a long history in San Francisco, and the current building is actually the 3rd iteration of the structure. The first structure was built in 1863 as a small, one-story structure atop the cliffs. Traveling to the resort was difficult and would take hours, making it only accessible to wealthy visitors. Guests of the first Cliff House included SF’s wealthiest families and even several presidents.

Second Cliff House, 1902. Photo via the Library of Congress

Despite its initial prestige, the resort declined in popularity over the years until legendary SF businessman Adolph Sutro bought the property in 1881, only for it to burn down several years later in 1894. Sutro wasted no time constructing a new, grander resort. By 1896, a new Victorian version was open to the public.

The massive 8-story building looked like a castle nestled on the cliffs. The resort had dining rooms, bars, dancing, art galleries, and more. Unfortunately, the beautiful building’s reign on the cliffs was short-lived, burning down in 1907.

In 1909, a third and final Cliff House was built, this time in concrete, by Emma Sutro Merritt. The building is still standing today with the same neoclassical design.

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Walking around Sea Cliff on Halloween night often provided sights such as a family of pumpkins or children dressed as princesses, ninjas, or even ninja princesses.

For years, the bougie neighborhood has drawn in families for Halloween, particularly those with younger kids, thanks to its quiet streets, wide sidewalks and jaw-dropping homes promising full-size candy bars and over-the-top decorations.

“We give out about 1,500 in three hours,” said Gary Bengier, who wore a George Washington costume as he handed out XL Hershey chocolate bars in front of his garage, replete with Halloween decor. “We like to do something fun for the kids.”

But despite the hundreds of kids crowding the sidewalks, the sought-after full-size candy bars from wealthy homeowners appeared in short supply—with many children’s bags surprisingly limp as the night drew to a close. 

Families trick-or-treat in the Sea Cliff neighborhood in San Francisco on Halloween night on Tuesday. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

Along El Camino Del Mar, one of the more popular Sea Cliff streets with trick-or-treaters, homes decorated for Halloween were sparse, and groups of kids often passed several houses between stops for more candy, rather than going house-to-house in a continuous trick-or-treating spree.

Many homes had no decorations at all, and no lights came on inside them during the three hours The Standard spent in the neighborhood until 7:30 p.m.

“It used to be more decorations,” said 27-year Sea Cliff resident Kayda Ono alongside her 17-year-old son, Aiden, who was dressed as Aladdin. “When he was 5 years old, it was all the houses.”

‘A Robin Williams Effect‘

Multiple homeowners and locals said the Sea Cliff neighborhood’s Halloween celebrations had begun to slowly die down since the death of Robin Williams in 2014.

“There was definitely a Robin Williams effect,” said Andy McLaughlin, who has lived on Sea Cliff Avenue since 2010.

Families trick-or-treat in the Sea Cliff neighborhood in San Francisco on Halloween night on Tuesday. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

When McLaughlin moved in with his family, he said they would get around 900 kids every Halloween, with children lining up from their door to the sidewalk. This Halloween was different, even with at least six homes on her street giving out candy.

“This is the quietest night we had in 10 years, even with Covid,” Andy’s wife, Kendra McLaughlin, said.

The McLaughlin’s Sea Cliff home was richly decorated for Halloween on Tuesday. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

Others agreed with the sentiment that Williams’ death coincided with the decline in spookiness around Sea Cliff.

“Really, I think it was his passing that changed things,” Outer Richmond resident Donovan Truong said as his niece, Zoe, clambered into a stroller while clad in a pink tutu and plastic faux-diamond tiara. Truong said he was born and raised in the Richmond District and would trick-or-treat every year in Sea Cliff. “You’d look around and see all these houses without the lights on.”

Williams would give out glowstick necklaces instead of candy for Halloween, multiple residents said. 

Robin Williams’ former Sea Cliff home at 540 El Camino Del Mar is up for sale at a price of $25 million. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

“One year, he gave out toothbrushes too,” Sea Cliff resident Thatcher Davis said. “We thought it was hilarious, but the kids hated it.”

Williams’ former Sea Cliff home is currently up for sale at an asking price of $25 million.

Aging Owners, ‘Vacant’ Homes

Other Sea Cliff residents seemed to think part of the issue was that many of the longtime neighborhood residents grew older and could no longer physically hand out candy for hours on Halloween.

“It used to be the destination when Robin Williams was around,” said Craig Fong, who has lived on El Camino Del Mar for 22 years. “We’ve seen the residents aging, so they don’t participate anymore.”

Many of Sea Cliff’s homes are vacant or used as vacation homes by the wealthy, neighbors also told The Standard.

Families trick-or-treat in the Sea Cliff neighborhood in San Francisco on Halloween night on Tuesday. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

“This neighborhood used to be really popular for Halloween,” said Davis, who has lived on El Camino Del Mar for 15 years. “But, unfortunately, a lot of the homes are empty, or you have older people who aren’t comfortable giving out candy.” 

The Standard could not independently corroborate the neighbor’s claims the homes were empty. Locals said they knew which homes were vacant due to their long-standing presence in the neighborhood.

“I know because I live here,” said Michelle Molfino, who has lived in Sea Cliff for 20 years. “If you walk up Sea Cliff Avenue, there’s a bunch of vacant homes.”

Sea Cliff resident Michelle Molfino stands on El Camino Del Mar dressed for Halloween on Tuesday. | Source: Garrett Leahy/The Standard

The city will start a new vacant homes tax in January 2024 after voters approved it in the Nov. 8, 2022, election. The Empty Homes Tax would apply to homeowners with homes containing three or more housing units. 

Those subject to the tax would owe between $2,500 and $5,000 per vacant unit in the first year with the tax rising up to $20,000 by the third year for every unit that has been empty for longer than six months. Units exempted from the tax include single-family homes, duplexes and units under construction, among other exemptions. Filing and payment will begin for most people in 2025. 

But some locals think Sea Cliff is just in a spooky rut. Kendra thinks Sea Cliff Avenue is on the upswing as a Halloween destination.

“We’ve had some younger families moving in,” McLaughlin said. “I think in the next few years, it’ll really pick up more.”

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Who wouldn’t want to run San Francisco’s famous Cliff House—even if you weren’t sure if you could call the 160-year-old restaurant on the Pacific Ocean the “Cliff House”?

Vacant since its longtime leaseholders left on New Year’s Eve 2020, the oceanfront restaurant at the western edge of the city is starting to accumulate wear and tear—although not nearly as bad as the storm-ravaged Camera Obscura just south of it and nowhere near to the degree of the Sutro Baths, those magnificent ruins immediately to the north.

In September, the National Park Service revealed that the agency had found someone willing to take it on, confirming that the restaurant lease would be for a period of 20 years. While the new concessionaire is nominally called Sutro Lands End Partners LLC, the mover and shaker behind it is attorney and Richmond District native Alex Leff, who has helped revive famous Southern California piers in Malibu, Oceanside and, soon, Huntington Beach. 

A view of the former Cliff House above Ocean Beach in San Francisco is seen without its Art Deco sign on Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023. | Source: Astrid Kane/The Standard

Like wealthy-engineer-turned-mayor Adolph Sutro—who didn’t construct the first Cliff House but built the streetcar line that made it an accessible destination—Leff is from an immigrant family and wants to bring some vigor to the enterprise before it corrodes in the salt air. The Cliff House is where he had his first taste of alcohol, a sip of his mother’s gin fizz when he was far from old enough. As he describes it, restoring the building is an act of civic pride swaddled in nostalgia. 

“The Cliff House is part of my heritage,” Leff told The Standard. “I would go there as a child. I would go there as an adult. I’m just so honored to have a chance to bring it back to life for San Franciscans.”

Notably, it’s not a single restaurant. The prior iteration had the upscale Bistro at the Cliff House as well as the more casual Sutro’s at the Cliff House, plus the lessee is responsible for an event space and a retail space as well as a cafe in the Lands End Lookout, an entirely separate building hundreds of yards away. 

The current version of the Cliff House is actually the third, with the original building having burned down in the 1800s. | Source: Jane Tyska/East Bay Times/Getty ImagesAlmost three years after the Hountalas family vacated, the building is gradually beginning to show signs of decay. | Source: Astrid Kane/The Standard

What Sutro Lands End Partners LLC can do with a landmarked property is somewhat limited, of course. Reached for comment, Golden Gate National Recreation Area spokesperson Julian Espinoza confirmed that the overall look and layout will remain the same. 

“This is because of a combination of leasing terms and the historic nature of the building,” Espinoza said. “Potential renovations would generally have more to do with function than aesthetics, as the overall architectural style of the property must be maintained.”

Hoping not to install a pricey tourist trap in such a prime location, Leff has pledged to hold community meetings to solicit locals’ opinions on what should happen.

“We want to do something that has multiple offerings, multiple price points—things that someone can come with a family and enjoy and that will bring San Franciscans back there again,” he said. 

The Neoclassical Cliff House is a familiar sight to anyone driving or walking along Point Lobos Avenue as it curves downhill toward San Francisco’s Ocean Beach. | Source: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

The issue is that the Cliff House’s previous concessionaires, the Hountalas family, left on unhappy terms. Having run the restaurant complex since 1973—several years before the National Park Service bought it as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area—they were unable to come to an agreement on a five-year extension to their 20-year lease that terminated in 2018, essentially operating without one for the final two years and bringing a decades-long run to an end.

“For most of it, it was very pleasant. We made a lot of friends and worked together very closely. That situation doesn’t exist now,” former co-proprietor Mary Hountalas told The Standard. “There has been nobody in the local GGNRA that really has any interest in what has happened in the Cliff House.”

Hountalas is a self-described “Summer of Love arrival” who’s lived here since 1967. Like Alex Leff, her husband, Dan, is a native of the Richmond District, and part of one of the many Greek families in the neighborhood. The nearby Louis’ Restaurant, just up Point Lobos Avenue from the Cliff House, is another example of a National Park Service-run entity that was long operated by Greek Americans and now lies vacant, a point that Mary Hountalas cites as evidence of the federal agency’s mismanagement.

“I’m sorry, the park service is notorious for neglect,” she said. “Poor Mr. Leff, the money he is going to have to put into the Cliff House building is because they allowed to let the place go for the last three years.”

This aerial view was shot by drone shortly before the restaurant closed for business on Dec. 31, 2020. | Source: Jane Tyska/East Bay Times/Getty ImagesThe Cliff House has been a local landmark for more than 150 years. | Source: Jane Tyska/East Bay Times/Getty Images

A ventilation system the Hountalas’ installed is now severely rusting, she said. Same goes for many of the doors, as well as the interior electrical system. Irrespective of its mechanical condition, the interior of the 27,000-square-foot building, with two floors plus a mezzanine is likely to be modernized and reconfigured. San Francisco Chronicle critic Michael Bauer once compared it to a gymnasium, noting that a secondary dining room had more character than the main space.

Then there’s the matter of the five Cliff House trademarks and the all-caps, Art Deco-style rooftop signage that was removed the day the Hountalas vacated as crowds of onlookers watched. Hountlas confirmed that her family has possession of them all.

The controversial trademarking of the restaurant’s name was done “with the complete knowledge of park service personnel,” she said, after restaurants up and down the Pacific Coast began using the name and copying the menu. Hountalas disputes any allegations that banks hold claim to the copyrights as collateral for business loans, but says the family is open to negotiations about the use of the name Cliff House.

The Hountalases are, if anything, adamant that the Cliff House letters need to go back on the building. Mary Hountalas has never met Leff personally, but they’re in the “have your people call my people” phase.

“We had an intermediary who was having discussions with him prior to him being awarded the lease,” she said. 

Leff confirmed to The Standard on Thursday that he’s been in communication with the Hountalases attorney, having spoken four or five times, although he would not discuss the terms of their negotiation over the Cliff House name. But the property is firmly in his possession.

“I have the keys,” he said. “We have contractors and people walking through.”

As the San Francisco Chronicle reported, the clock is ticking. Leff’s first year of rent is free, but he’ll owe $235,000 for the second, a number that will more than double, to $499,000 two years later. Leff expects to welcome the public to some parts of the complex before the entire operation is up and running.

“We’re trying to activate spaces on the perimeter of the building, which may then allow the public to enjoy the property while we’re still working on the interior,” he said. “We hope sometime in 2024.”

What that property will be called, though, is still up in the salty air. 

An exterior of back of former location of The Cliff House above Ocean Beach in San Francisco on Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023. | Source: Astrid Kane/The Standard

The post San Francisco’s Cliff Home Could Reopen Underneath Totally different Title appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

KGO

This image from the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office shows the Tesla on a rocky beach below the cliffs, in an area called Devil’s Slide.

CNN
—

A California man accused of intentionally driving himself, his wife and two children off a cliff on a coastal road, told police he pulled over to the side of the road to check the car’s tire pressure, according to court documents which is available only to the San Francisco courts Chronicle.

His wife told first responders that her husband, 41-year-old Dharmesh Patel, purposely pushed her off the cliff, the Chronicle reported, citing an affidavit through a search warrant.

The outlet did not put the court documents online.

Patel was charged with three counts of attempted murder in January after prosecutors claimed he intentionally diverted his Tesla off a section of the Pacific Coast Highway called Devil’s Slide, crashing the family about 250 feet into a rocky beach. All four family members survived the crash. He pleaded not guilty to the charges.

CNN has reached out to Patel’s attorney and his wife, Neha Patel, for comment. CNN is also working to obtain a copy of the court documents.

As rescuers pulled family members from the car, the woman told an emergency services worker “something to the effect that the driver, her husband Dharmesh Patel, did this on purpose,” CHP officer Aaron Sapien wrote in a three-page search warrant affidavit, in the grounds wanted for the confiscation of Patel’s property, reports the Chronicle.

“She then told him that her husband needed a psychological evaluation,” Sapien wrote in the affidavit, according to the Chronicle. “She said suspect Patel chased her away and repeated this several times.”

Another emergency responder also recalled hearing Neha say Patel deliberately drove off the cliff and “was trying to kill everyone,” Sapien wrote in the affidavit, the Chronicle reports.

During an interview with police after the incident, Patel told investigators that he and his family drove about 20 miles to his brother’s home in Montara, Calif., the Chronicle reports, citing the search warrant. He told officers he stopped at three gas stations along the way to inflate the left rear tire, but his dash sensor continued to show low pressure, the search warrant said, the outlet said. While driving the freeway, Patel said the car “started to feel different,” Sapien wrote in the warrant, the outlet says.

“Patel then moved the Tesla onto the ‘unpaved road’ to check tire pressures,” the officer wrote in the search warrant, according to the Chronicle. “Patel said it was only a short distance before they fell off the cliff.”

Patel also told officers he was not on any medication or under the influence of alcohol at the time of the accident, the search warrant states, the outlet said.

“When asked if he felt depressed, he replied that he wasn’t really depressed, he just felt depressed because of the bad times in the world, the war and the drugs,” Sapien wrote in the search warrant, says the Chronicle. “When asked if he felt suicidal, he replied, ‘You know, not like a plan, not normally,’ and said he was more worried about the world.”

In response to the Chronicle’s report, San Mateo District Attorney Stephen Wagstaffe told CNN there was “nothing new for us” while his office drafted the documents supporting the search warrants. “The details in the documents are important evidence of the allegations we have made against Mr. Patel,” he said.

According to court documents, Patel is scheduled to appear in court for a preliminary hearing on June 12.

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San Francisco supervisor Connie Chan fondly recalls her first visits to the legendary Cliff House as a 13-year-old immigrant to the city. The only cousin in her family who had a car drove her from Chinatown to the coast. Later, as an adult and a resident of Outer Richmond, Chan would take her late mother and young son to the sun-drenched seaside dining room for weekend brunch or visit them for a celebratory glass of bubbly during the holidays.

Now, like so many others in San Francisco, she is excited to see what will find space on the valuable lot, which has been vacant since 2020. And even though the building is in her neighborhood, Chan remains in the dark about his future.

The National Park Service, which operates the building in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, announced in February that a new restaurant had been chosen for the space — but would not say who, citing ongoing lease negotiations. The National Park Service again declined to disclose the mystery tenant last week.

Ever since the grounds’ beloved 157-year-old restaurant closed after lease talks collapsed between the National Park Service and the former longtime owners (who also trademarked the Cliff House name), there has been fervent interest in the Cliff House’s fate them). Since then there have been two tenders to find a new tenant, multiple delays and endless rumors about the future of the building. Reddit threads devoted to the subject abound with speculation and hopes for his next life (one poster suggested a Taco Bell/Pizza Hut combo).

“Many generations of San Franciscans are connected with a lot of feeling and nostalgia. Everyone’s excited,” said Chan, who frequently answers questions about the Cliff House. “They’re really big footsteps for anyone to fill.”

The current incarnation of the Cliff House as seen in 2009, 100 years after it was last rebuilt in 1909.

Liz Hafalia/The Chronicle 2009

On April 14, 2022, nine organizations — including a longtime Bay Area bakery chain, a giant international real estate company, and a company affiliated with the President of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce — toured the building as part of the public procurement tender (RFP) process, according to National Park Service documents obtained by The Chronicle through a public records request.

The Chronicle successfully contacted eight of the participants and confirmed that none of them are opening a restaurant in the former Cliff House.

The ninth, Terminal Plaza Associates, a company registered with the city as a real estate, rental and leasing services company, and its owner, San Francisco Attorney Alexander Leff, did not respond to requests for comment, including emails, phone messages and a letter dropped off at his law firm’s office. Leff appears to have been involved in two similar previous projects: a 2007 bid to open a coffee shop in Coit Tower and a proposed revitalization of dining facilities on Malibu Pier. Terminal Plaza Associates also participated in a site visit for Cliff House’s first tender in 2019, according to National Park Service documents.

Some of the other eight tour participants said they had submitted unsuccessful bids for the aging, 27,000-square-foot site. Many have said that whoever does the lease must be someone willing and able to take on a large, likely multimillion-dollar project enmeshed in federal bureaucracy.

“It’s going to be someone with a lot of resources,” wrote Michael Mindel, who owns Poggio Trattoria in Sausalito and toured the property, in an email to The Chronicle. “This operation is like the Titanic in scope: so many moving parts, mandated requirements for operation, and delayed maintenance.”

Diners eat at the Cliff House in 2019. A new, unannounced restaurant will take its place.

Paul Kuroda/The Chronicle 2019 Special

Brian McGonigle of SF Wine Center, a wine bar, wine storage and wine school near the Embarcadero, was with several investor partners and a general contractor at the property inspection in April. He envisioned converting the building, perched on high, sheer cliffs, into a wine bar, accompanied by a separate, private dining and wine club in a banquet room with a private oceanfront terrace.

But the cost of updating and then maintaining the long-standing space felt prohibitive, even “scary,” he said. A 2018 property appraisal prepared for the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy found that the Cliff House was in “fair condition” at the time, but required more than $3.5 million in repairs, from old plumbing fixtures and “extensive” rusting to ditch drains that were “partially” filled with sand and have grass growing out of them.” The building’s prime oceanfront location cuts both ways and offers dramatic views, but is exposed to the elements. Most damage, the report says, is “the result of delayed recurring maintenance or delayed component replacement.” A second report in 2021 found many conditions continued to deteriorate while the building sat vacant.

Eventually, McGonigle didn’t submit a bid because of the condition of the building. Had he bid, he would have demanded big concessions, rent-free for about five years. He theorized that maintenance issues have complicated lease negotiations and may be why they’re taking so long.

“It was hard to gauge because you couldn’t tell exactly when things would wear out or fail,” McGonigle said. “But the takeaway was that it could be great (or) it could be a nightmare.”

Boudin Bakery, another San Francisco institution present at the property tour, also declined an offer, confirmed CEO Daniel Giraudo.

International real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield has submitted a bid on behalf of a client, Vice Chairman Kazuko Morgan confirmed. You didn’t get it.

“It’s unique, but it took a lot of work,” Morgan said.

Hundreds of people watched as the Cliff House sign was removed in December 2020 after the popular seaside restaurant closed.

Santiago Mejia/The Chronicle 2020

The lease covers both the Cliff House building and the coffee shop at the nearby Lands End Visitor Center at 680 Point Lobos Ave. The new tenant must offer fine dining and casual dining, a gift shop and valet parking, according to the draft lease. In the years leading up to the pandemic, all of the companies had annual sales of $15 million and employed nearly 200 full- and part-time workers, according to the National Park Service.

Meanwhile, the fate of Louis’ Restaurant, the nearby 83-year-old diner with a similarly spectacular view that closed in 2020 and is also operated by the National Park Service, remains uncertain. The federal agency said it plans to issue a solicitation for proposals to find a new tenant for the 902 Point Lobos Ave. to be found, although it is unclear when.

There are high hopes in San Francisco that the National Park Service will select a local facility to breathe new life into the Cliff House site, first built in 1863 and woven into the fabric of the city. It’s a major economic driver for the Outer Richmond neighborhood, Chan said, which has also lost nearby dining spots like Louis’ and the restaurant at the Seal Rock Inn during the pandemic. She asked the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and other organizations to publicize the RFP in hopes of attracting a local business.

But it’s not clear that will be the case.

A persistent rumor was that one of the big companies already providing food in national parks would be a likely candidate. And ExplorUS, a hospitality management company that oversees food programs at parks across the country, participated in the property inspection last April. But the company hasn’t made a bid for the Cliff House, said Amy Trimble, ExplorUS vice president of marketing.

During the first bidding in 2019, other small, independent businesses toured the Cliff House site, including Outer Sunset Café Andytown Coffee Roasters and Half Moon Bay Restaurant La Costanera. At the time, an interested tenant asked the national park administration whether the federal authority had a “commitment” to award the lease to a local company.

“The basis of the respondent’s location is not a factor that the service takes into account,” the agency said.

Regardless, Supervisor Chan said she was very calm about the next chapter of Cliff House.

“Let’s give them a chance,” Chan said of the new tenant. “No matter who it is, I tell myself this: keep my judgement. Keep an open mind and welcoming because I want them to be successful.”

Reach Elena Kadvany: elena.kadvany@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ekadvany

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Park officials posted this photo on Twitter showing the structure sliding down the cliff.Golden Gate National Recreation Area

• A World War II battery bunker fell off a cliff onto a San Francisco beach, officials said Monday.

• It is the latest in a series of landslides across California that have resulted from saturated soil.

• Record rain and flooding have plagued the state steadily since New Year’s Eve.

A huge WWII-era military building tumbled off a sandy cliff onto a San Francisco beach.

The incident at Fort Funston, a city park with 200-foot oceanfront bluffs, is the latest in a series of landslides in Northern California caused by a barrage of heavy rainstorms.

The Golden Gate National Recreation Area reported the incident and shared a photo on Twitter Monday.

“Beachcombers at Fort Funston today will share the beach with a WWII military structure that was undermined when saturated cliff sand slid onto the beach,” the tweet reads.

“Coastal authorities encourage visitors to exercise caution near post-storm saturated hillsides and coastal bluffs as they enjoy weeks of sunny days indoors,” the Golden Gate National Recreation Area post said.

A spokesman for the San Francisco Fire Department told SFGATE that the building was a former battery bunker.

Aerial video footage from local news station ABC7 shows the bunker at the base of a sand slide sliding down a high cliff.

Since New Year’s Eve, California has weathered a spate of atmospheric flows — long, narrow streams of water vapor from the tropics that can carry as much water as the average river at the mouth of the Mississippi.

The record-breaking storms and flooding have caused 19 deaths across the state, along with road closures, evacuations, power outages, sinkholes and mudslides. The deluge is finally set to end this week.

Still, the attack hasn’t brought in enough water to end the multi-year mega-drought plaguing the state. Scientists expect both drought and flood extremes in California to become more severe with rising global temperatures, including powerful atmospheric flows like these.

Read the original article on Insider

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When Nicole Meldahl and her group Western Neighborhoods Project raised money to buy up and save historic artifacts from the recently-closed Cliff House restaurant in March 2021, she had no idea at the time what venue she’d be able to display them in.

It certainly never dawned on her that the group might one day get the chance to display them in the same venue they’d come from.

“Never imagining one day the National Park Service would give us the keys to the Cliff House,” Meldahl said.

As the NPS searches for a new restaurant operator to take over San Francisco’s venerable Cliff House, it has indeed allowed Western Neighborhoods Project to turn the empty restaurant into a temporary museum, with its sweeping views and historic artifacts as the centerpiece.

In the Cliff House in an exhibit called Naiad Cove — the name of the adjacent cove where the ruins of Sutro Baths rest — the group paid tribute to the neighborhood known as Lands End and its once-iconic roadside destinations like the old Sutro Baths and Playland at the Beach.

Inside the restaurant, there’s a tribute to the old Sutro Baths, which includes vintage bathing suits and a locker believed to have been saved from the old building. There are original posters and photos of the famous baths, flanked by the actual Sutro Baths ruins just outside the window.

“I think this is what makes this exhibition so wonderful and so powerful, is that you’re really experiencing this history in the place that created it,” Meldahl said.

The former restaurant booths inside the Cliff House pay tribute to the restaurant that served generations before closing during the pandemic.

One room holds signs from the long-gone Playland at the Beach, with the sounds of an old amusement park lending an air of authenticity. A tall wooden cowboy that once stood in the nearby amusement park looms over the room.

The darkened, empty kitchens now display historic projections by artist Ben Wood, who has been projecting period photos and videos from Cliff House history out of the gift shop windows for months. The rooms are washed with a sound installation by Andrew Roth.

The restaurant even holds a tribute to the restaurant itself with a series of place settings from different eras of the Cliff House along with the menus displaying period prices.

“We’ve staged six vignettes at the bar to represent six different experiences patrons would’ve had coming here,” Meldahl explained.

When the Cliff House restaurant permanently closed under the weight of the pandemic, Western Neighborhoods Project rallied to save its collection of historic memorabilia from the auction block. The group raised $180,000 in an effort to prevent the collection from getting spread to the wind.

A crew hoists one of a pair of porcelain muses for an exhibit inside the Cliff House.

Among the objects it saved were a pair of porcelain “muses” figures that had lived in the old Cliff House for ages. On a recent day, Meldahl watched as an arts preservation team helped stage the two large figures.

Alexandra Mitchell, whose company ACT Art Conservation LLC is caring for the artifacts said it was important for the public to view the Cliff House objects back in their original home.

“People can visualize it themselves while they’re here looking at the pieces that were here,” Mitchell said. “You’re seeing the same view, you’re seeing the same ocean waves that have crashed on the shore the whole time.”

Aside from the artifacts, the exhibit is a rare opportunity for the public to visit one of San Francisco’s iconic destinations and view it outside its normal state as a bustling restaurant.

There are windows where generations of visitors have sipped cocktails while watching the day’s last rays glancing across seal rock. There is the long counter where visitors bellied up for the restaurant’s signature poppers, or Bloody Mary’s.

“There’s all these people,” said Great Highway Gallery owner John Lindsey, who is curating the exhibit. “Not only do they have a lot of memories of what’s around us, they have a lot of memories of what’s inside this building.”

As far as the Cliff House’s future goes, the National Park Service put out bids for a new restauranteur to take over the space and is now reviewing those bids. In the meantime, the special exhibit is scheduled to run until Aug. 21, although Meldahl hopes it might be extended. The exhibit is free, but visitors must register in advance.

“People who said they never came here because it was too expensive now find themselves able to take in this incredible view, doing the same thing San Franciscans and visitors have been doing since 1863,” Meldahl said.

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When Nicole Meldahl and her group Western Neighborhoods Project raised money to buy up and save historic artifacts from the recently-closed Cliff House restaurant in March 2021, she had no idea at the time what venue she’d be able to display them in.

It certainly never dawned on her that the group might one day get the chance to display them in the same venue they’d come from.

“Never imagining one day the National Park Service would give us the keys to the Cliff House,” Meldahl said.

As the NPS searches for a new restaurant operator to take over San Francisco’s venerable Cliff House, it has indeed allowed Western Neighborhoods Project to turn the empty restaurant into a temporary museum, with its sweeping views and historic artifacts as the centerpiece.

In the Cliff House in an exhibit called Naiad Cove — the name of the adjacent cove where the ruins of Sutro Baths rest — the group paid tribute to the neighborhood known as Lands End and its once-iconic roadside destinations like the old Sutro Baths and Playland at the Beach.

Inside the restaurant, there’s a tribute to the old Sutro Baths, which includes vintage bathing suits and a locker believed to have been saved from the old building. There are original posters and photos of the famous baths, flanked by the actual Sutro Baths ruins just outside the window.

“I think this is what makes this exhibition so wonderful and so powerful, is that you’re really experiencing this history in the place that created it,” Meldahl said.

The former restaurant booths inside the Cliff House pay tribute to the restaurant that served generations before closing during the pandemic.

One room holds signs from the long-gone Playland at the Beach, with the sounds of an old amusement park lending an air of authenticity. A tall wooden cowboy that once stood in the nearby amusement park looms over the room.

The darkened, empty kitchens now display historic projections by artist Ben Wood, who has been projecting period photos and videos from Cliff House history out of the gift shop windows for months. The rooms are washed with a sound installation by Andrew Roth.

The restaurant even holds a tribute to the restaurant itself with a series of place settings from different eras of the Cliff House along with the menus displaying period prices.

“We’ve staged six vignettes at the bar to represent six different experiences patrons would’ve had coming here,” Meldahl explained.

When the Cliff House restaurant permanently closed under the weight of the pandemic, Western Neighborhoods Project rallied to save its collection of historic memorabilia from the auction block. The group raised $180,000 in an effort to prevent the collection from getting spread to the wind.

A crew hoists one of a pair of porcelain muses for an exhibit inside the Cliff House.

Among the objects it saved were a pair of porcelain “muses” figures that had lived in the old Cliff House for ages. On a recent day, Meldahl watched as an arts preservation team helped stage the two large figures.

Alexandra Mitchell, whose company ACT Art Conservation LLC is caring for the artifacts said it was important for the public to view the Cliff House objects back in their original home.

“People can visualize it themselves while they’re here looking at the pieces that were here,” Mitchell said. “You’re seeing the same view, you’re seeing the same ocean waves that have crashed on the shore the whole time.”

Aside from the artifacts, the exhibit is a rare opportunity for the public to visit one of San Francisco’s iconic destinations and view it outside its normal state as a bustling restaurant.

There are windows where generations of visitors have sipped cocktails while watching the day’s last rays glancing across seal rock. There is the long counter where visitors bellied up for the restaurant’s signature poppers, or Bloody Mary’s.

“There’s all these people,” said Great Highway Gallery owner John Lindsey, who is curating the exhibit. “Not only do they have a lot of memories of what’s around us, they have a lot of memories of what’s inside this building.”

As far as the Cliff House’s future goes, the National Park Service put out bids for a new restauranteur to take over the space and is now reviewing those bids. In the meantime, the special exhibit is scheduled to run until Aug. 21, although Meldahl hopes it might be extended. The exhibit is free, but visitors must register in advance.

“People who said they never came here because it was too expensive now find themselves able to take in this incredible view, doing the same thing San Franciscans and visitors have been doing since 1863,” Meldahl said.

The post San Francisco’s Cliff Home Now a Momentary Museum – NBC Bay Space appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

When Nicole Meldahl and her group Western Neighborhoods Project raised money to buy up and save historic artifacts from the recently-closed Cliff House restaurant in March 2021, she had no idea at the time what venue she’d be able to display them in.

It certainly never dawned on her that the group might one day get the chance to display them in the same venue they’d come from.

“Never imagining one day the National Park Service would give us the keys to the Cliff House,” Meldahl said.

As the NPS searches for a new restaurant operator to take over San Francisco’s venerable Cliff House, it has indeed allowed Western Neighborhoods Project to turn the empty restaurant into a temporary museum, with its sweeping views and historic artifacts as the centerpiece.

In the Cliff House in an exhibit called Naiad Cove — the name of the adjacent cove where the ruins of Sutro Baths rest — the group paid tribute to the neighborhood known as Lands End and its once-iconic roadside destinations like the old Sutro Baths and Playland at the Beach.

Inside the restaurant, there’s a tribute to the old Sutro Baths, which includes vintage bathing suits and a locker believed to have been saved from the old building. There are original posters and photos of the famous baths, flanked by the actual Sutro Baths ruins just outside the window.

“I think this is what makes this exhibition so wonderful and so powerful, is that you’re really experiencing this history in the place that created it,” Meldahl said.

The former restaurant booths inside the Cliff House pay tribute to the restaurant that served generations before closing during the pandemic.

One room holds signs from the long-gone Playland at the Beach, with the sounds of an old amusement park lending an air of authenticity. A tall wooden cowboy that once stood in the nearby amusement park looms over the room.

The darkened, empty kitchens now display historic projections by artist Ben Wood, who has been projecting period photos and videos from Cliff House history out of the gift shop windows for months. The rooms are washed with a sound installation by Andrew Roth.

The restaurant even holds a tribute to the restaurant itself with a series of place settings from different eras of the Cliff House along with the menus displaying period prices.

“We’ve staged six vignettes at the bar to represent six different experiences patrons would’ve had coming here,” Meldahl explained.

When the Cliff House restaurant permanently closed under the weight of the pandemic, Western Neighborhoods Project rallied to save its collection of historic memorabilia from the auction block. The group raised $180,000 in an effort to prevent the collection from getting spread to the wind.

A crew hoists one of a pair of porcelain muses for an exhibit inside the Cliff House.

Among the objects it saved were a pair of porcelain “muses” figures that had lived in the old Cliff House for ages. On a recent day, Meldahl watched as an arts preservation team helped stage the two large figures.

Alexandra Mitchell, whose company ACT Art Conservation LLC is caring for the artifacts said it was important for the public to view the Cliff House objects back in their original home.

“People can visualize it themselves while they’re here looking at the pieces that were here,” Mitchell said. “You’re seeing the same view, you’re seeing the same ocean waves that have crashed on the shore the whole time.”

Aside from the artifacts, the exhibit is a rare opportunity for the public to visit one of San Francisco’s iconic destinations and view it outside its normal state as a bustling restaurant.

There are windows where generations of visitors have sipped cocktails while watching the day’s last rays glancing across seal rock. There is the long counter where visitors bellied up for the restaurant’s signature poppers, or Bloody Mary’s.

“There’s all these people,” said Great Highway Gallery owner John Lindsey, who is curating the exhibit. “Not only do they have a lot of memories of what’s around us, they have a lot of memories of what’s inside this building.”

As far as the Cliff House’s future goes, the National Park Service put out bids for a new restauranteur to take over the space and is now reviewing those bids. In the meantime, the special exhibit is scheduled to run until Aug. 21, although Meldahl hopes it might be extended. The exhibit is free, but visitors must register in advance.

“People who said they never came here because it was too expensive now find themselves able to take in this incredible view, doing the same thing San Franciscans and visitors have been doing since 1863,” Meldahl said.

The post San Francisco’s Cliff Home Now a Momentary Museum – NBC Bay Space appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

June 13, 2022Updated: June 13, 2022 2:43 pm

The Cliff House, San Francisco.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

A man who climbed down near San Francisco’s legendary Cliff House was trapped on a cliff ledge early Monday morning, necessitating a rescue by fire officials.

At around 7:40 am, the San Francisco Fire Department embarked on a cliff rescue after an adult man scaled down rocks near the restaurant and ended up on the ledge near a wall covered in graffiti.

“The male was curious and climbed rocks placing himself in a need for being rescued,” San Francisco Fire spokesperson Lt. Jonathan Baxter told SFGATE in an emailed statement Monday afternoon.

Videos posted on Twitter within the hour show a member of the fire crew affixing rescue rope onto the man and scaling the wall together. The rescue was completed just after 8 am

UPDATE: 1 ADULT MALE RESCUED BY #YOURSFFD AND PER #SFFDEMS WILL BE OKAY– INCIDENT CLOSED https://t.co/TzrFEDaESC pic.twitter.com/o8QjCZGTAg

— SAN FRANCISCO FIRE DEPARTMENT MEDIA (@SFFDPIO) June 13, 2022

The man was “safely rescued and unharmed,” said Baxter.

“This is why we ask that you always stay on designated paths or trails,” Baxter added.

Last year, the National Park Service confirmed the fate of the historic San Francisco fixture: A new restaurant will be installed by the end of 2022; a decision will be made as to who the lessee will be in the coming months.

Baxter did not identify the victim, stating that “he is considered a victim.”

Joshua Bote is an assistant news editor for SFGATE. He grew up in the Los Angeles area, went to UC Berkeley and has previously worked as a reporter at USA Today and a music writer at NPR. Email: joshua.bote@sfgate.com

The post Video reveals climber trapped close to San Francisco’s Cliff Home appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.