Infinite City: A San Francisco Atlas (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
4 stars for presentation, 3.5 for enjoyment. What a fascinating project! The maps & essays in this collection brought to life for me a city and an area with which I have only the barest of familiarity. As an outsider, I didn't feel the same connection to the material that a true San Francisco native would probably feel, but I certainly learned a bit about the history of the area and its inhabitants. Each map is unique but they all help paint a colorful and informative picture of a particular place with its myriad peoples, principals, dreams, triumphs and disasters. I wish someone would undertake a similar project for Portland. This is the coolest book I have come across in a long time, well deserving of a detailed review. It's a collection of maps created by different artists and cartographers, focusing on different aspects of San Francisco history and lore.. It reads a bit like a travelogue, but more like an extended and diverse cultural commentary. It also contains some of the most interesting meditations on urbanism and the meaning of maps in our culture that I have come across.One chapter highlights a map of cinemas that existed circa 1958, when Vertigo was released, as well as the sites highlighted in the film itself. Of course, few of the original cinemas remain, displace by modern muti-plex screens.Another chapter challenges the notion of San Francisco as a ultra progressive city,highlighting the military and defense sector and their headquarters.I now know to look for the Sand Lot, where there were massive anti-Chinese riots in 1877, ironically located across the street from the Asian Art museum. Wouldn't have learned this in any typical guidebook, I am sure.And of particular interest to me is the diverse history of Fillmore Street, captured on a map that describes the redevelopment of an area called A2, where many historic Victorians were deemed blighted and destroyed in the name of progress, replaced by projects, demolished again in recent years.And there's more lighthearted, fun maps in here, too, of course: one mapping the coffee culture across the city, for example.Fascinating look at a city not yet familiar to me, and way better for trip planning than anything else I have glanced through.
What do You think about Infinite City: A San Francisco Atlas (2010)?
san francisco and maps are two of my favorite things, and this book has both. this was so worth it.
—ashbury
I'd be happy to read more books like this - on NY, on Paris, on Prague.
—harriet
