June 2009 | Eyesore

Commentary on architectural blunders in monthly serial.

The new synagogue for Congregation Beth Shalom by architect Stanley Saitowitz in the Richmond district of San Francisco. Note the context of modest traditional row houses. Here we see the bone-weary Modernist convention of reducing semiotics to their starkest cartoon form, as if the cognitive ability of Americans was on the level of so many sea slugs. The semi-circular sanctuary wing is supposed to represent the Chanuka menorah (or nine-light candelabra). Get it? Folks in the neigborhood are referring to it as "God's own half-pipe." Who knows what the zinc-covered slab on the corner is supposed to convey -- perhaps the bureaucracy of the Ladies Garment Workers' Union. Thanks to Jason Tokuda of San Francisco for nominating this humdinger.