"Like a fantasy of classical antiquity, the Palace of Fine Arts was built by beaux arts disciple Bernard R Maybeck for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. It’s a crowning jewel in a newly confident city but unlike the other buildings it wasn’t meant to be permanent. Maybeck wanted the site to fall into gentle ruin but the city grew attached to it and restoration work turned it into a lasting structure – meaning partially demolishing and then rebuilding the original in the 1960s. Today it holds concerts and performances."