Foster to retrofit San Francisco’s iconic Transamerica Tower

The $250 million scheme for developer SHVO, which bought the site in 2020, will revitalise the famous 260m-tall pyramid-shaped tower designed by William Pereira and completed in 1972.

Foster + Partners was selected by the developer following an invited competition including Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and David Chipperfield Architects.

As well as overhauling the interiors of the landmark 48-storey downtown block – until recently the city's tallest building – the project will also revamp the areas around its base.

This includes expanding Redwood Park, almost doubling the size of the neighbouring office buildings - Two
Transamerica (505 Sansome Street) and Three Transamerica (545 Sansome Street) - and better integrating the tower into the local area by opening up its ground floors to the public.

In a video for SHVO, the luxury real estate developer set up by New York-based mogul Michael Shvo, Norman Foster said the revamp was ‘trying to create something that would create a ripple effect, that will link into the rest of the city, that will bring alive this block, which is a kind of monoculture.

He added: ‘The word iconic is overused but it’s truly an iconic building; it’s a piece of history. It’s about responding to a very specific climate of a city; it’s about health; it’s about sustainability; it’s about green.’

Speaking to the San Francisco Chronicle, Shvo said: ‘We want to make this place a focal center of downtown, and make sure people come here not only to work. It will not only transform the interior of the building but the landscape and the exterior and bring life to the entire site.

‘When you come to [the tower], there’s not much to do there.We want to change that.’

Officially named the Transamerica Pyramid Center, the building at 600 Montgomery Street was originally the headquarters for the insurance giant Transamerica Corporation before it moved to Baltimore.

The building has two wings accommodating an elevator shaft on the east and a stairwell and smoke tower on the west.

The initial revamp of the tower itself is expected to take a year to complete, with further approvals needed for the expansion of the nearby office blocks.