United Nations Plaza Fountain Introduction

Lawrence Halprin (1916-2009) was a legendary creative figure who lived and worked in the Bay Area. He was first and foremost a landscape architect, however, he also employed his talents in the fields of city planning, the visual arts and filmmaking.

United Nations Plaza Fountain, photographed by Charles A. Birnbaum, 2005 (source: The Cultural Landscape Foundation)

 
Halprin's United Nations Plaza Fountain was dedicated on June 26, 1977, the 32nd anniversary of the United Nations.  Located 600 feet from the Main Library, the fountain is marked off by longitudinal and latitudinal bands on the plaza's surface.

United Nations Plaza, Google Satellite View

The fountain takes up a footprint of 80 by 130 feet within the 2.6 acre United Nations Plaza. It consists of approximately 100 wire sawn pieces of Sierra white granite mined at the Raymond quarry near Fresno, granite symbolizing strength. This is the same granite used for City Hall and other civic buildings. These pieces were cut into varying shapes and range in width from 6 inches to four feet. The entire work weighs 3,300,000 pounds and is arranged into seven clusters that represent the seven continents.

Georgia Lindsay noted that with his fountains, Halprin aim to "represent" nature rather than "recreate" it. According to James Haas:

Halprin has developed an affection for Sierra Nevada views of water coursing through huge granite rocks, and he tried to bring that effect to his fountain by placing gigantic stacks of granite slabs around its outer edge up to twenty feet tall and smaller chunks of granite in the center, over which shot several spouts of water that eventually collected in pools.

The United Nations Plaza fountain has been alternately described as "smart" or "brainy." That was owing to a computer system that controlled water flow. It was to draw water from an underground creek below the plaza. The computer would be connected to gauges that would measure wind velocity in order to lower the flow when the weather was windy, lessening the spray that might soak passersby. The computer also would regulate the depth of water in the fountain's pools to vary from being dry to an accumulation of eight feet of water according to the time of day.

These computer controls apparently never worked for long, if at all.

From the moment it was proposed up through the present, Lawrence Halprin's United Nations Plaza Fountain has never ceased to be a source of controversy. Later blog entries will look at the fountain's troubled history.

Later entries:

"United Nations Plaza Fountain: A Troubled Birth" (August 1, 2023)

"United Nations Plaza Fountain: A Troubled Life" (August 17, 2023)

Bibliography

Adams, Gerald, "Another City Fountain Dispute Is Bubbling Up," San Francisco Examiner February 6, 1979.

Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker. Volume 68 (K.G. Saur, 2011).

Brown, Mary, San FranciscoModern Architecture and Landscape Design 1935-1970: Historic Context Statement. (San Francisco City and County Planning Department, 2011).

Cindy, "UN Plaza Fountain," Art and Architecture of San Francisco [blog] March 7, 2001.

Haas, James W., The San Francisco Civic Center: A History of the Design, Controversies, and Realization of A City Beautiful Masterpiece (University of Nevada Press, 2019).

Katz, Bernard S., Fountains of San Francisco (Lexikos/Don't Call It Frisco Press, 1989).

"Latest Plan to Revamp San Francisco’s U.N. Plaza Unveiled," The Cultural Landscape Foundation March 14, 2019

Lindsay, Georgia, Bricks, Branding, And the Everyday: Defining Greatness at the United Nations Plaza in San Francisco, Archnet-IJAR: International Journal of Architectural Research (July 2017).

Pacheco, Anthony, "Another Halprin-designed plaza could be on the chopping block, this time in San Francisco," The Architects Newspaper May 30, 2018.

Stack, Peter, "A Brainy Fountain Is Dedicated," San Francisco Chronicle April 26, 1977.