Fittingly, America's museum of architecture is itself a magnificently designed old building.

Home of modern dancer famously strangled by her own scarf.

A circus legend leaves an unexpected endowment.

A luxuriant botanical garden below sea level.

The bank that helped fund the Mexican-American War and the purchase of Alaska met its downfall after helping Augusto Pinochet launder money.

Adolph Sutro's little-known, geographically inaccurate, deprecated monument.

Gold Rush-era tombstones line the park's paths.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

The miraculous hydrant that saved the Mission District in 1906.

Nestled in the heart of San Francisco’s bustling Financial District stands a unique homage to the Mayan and Beaux Arts.

The giant pair of sexy legs sticking out the window of this costume store have become its main draw.

Since 1973, this block has been home to the most concentrated collection of murals in San Francisco.

A shop full of natural curiosities, carnivorous plants, and costumed taxidermied mice.

This shop specializes in oddities and Victorian-inspired wonders.

Bring your own cardboard to the slippery slopes of concrete hidden in a neighborhood park.

A peculiar mansion built by the troubled heir to the Winchester Rifle Company fortune.

A monument celebrating the idea of reaching inaccessible places.

"We Seceded Where Others Failed."

Only hotel where you can legally launder money.

Staircase winds down the side of Telegraph Hill through gardens, wild parrots flying overhead.

A whimsical antique shop with a strong air of mystery, filled with items from ages, and what feels like worlds, past.

Medical and zoological curiosities for sale.

A semi-scholarly approach to sex.

Thousands of turbines whir at the origin of North American wind power.