Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption, 1970, architects John Michael Lee, Paul A. Ryan and Angus McSweeney, Pier Luigi Nervi and Pietro Belluschi — on a very wet and changeable day. 

Oddly enough, even though San Francisco is probably the city I have most often visited without actually living in it — in fact, my wife and I had our honeymoon there over a quarter century ago — somehow I have never visited the Cathedral before. I think I heard acquaintances dismiss it as “Our Lady of Maytag” (the idea is that the roof resembles the agitator of a washing machine), and I never bothered to investigate further. 

But that marvelous roof!  Actually, that’s the point of this visit, made despite the weather. I independently developed a project a couple of years ago for a “House Absolute” formally composed of hyperbolic paraboloid segments, and it was only after I finished that someone thought to suggest I look at St. Mary’s to see how this sort of thing could work out.  

Of course, one could imagine a sort of alternative rationale for the cathedral’s cognomen: in a distant, dystopian future, the technological capabilities of the human race have so declined that clean clothing has become beyond the means of ordinary mortals. So of course, laundered garb becomes a symbol both sacerdotal and aspirational.

In other words: a scenario akin to A Canticle for Leibowitz, but with a longer rinse cycle. O gentle, chaste, and spotless Maid….