Litmaps · Discover SF

Bar, cafe, and library of human history at Fort Mason, run by the people building a 10,000-year clock. Smart cocktails and a bay view. A first date that gives you things to talk about.

The Beat-era bookstore Ferlinghetti built, still independent, still essential. Climb to the poetry room upstairs and lose an hour.

A beloved, creaky-floored warren of new and used books on Clement Street since 1967.

A specialty bookstore devoted to science fiction, fantasy, and horror, with an adjoining cafe.

A jewel-box shop devoted entirely to new, used, and antiquarian books about food and cooking.

Haight Street's flagship independent bookstore and a hub for author readings since 1976.

The turquoise corner shop on Valencia stocking new, used, and remaindered books since 1992.

A BIPOC-owned bookstore and gallery on 24th Street focused on radical and Spanish-language literature.

A former Christian Science church now housing the Wayback Machine and a hall of eerie staff statues.

Seven floors of modern and contemporary art behind that rippling white facade. Do the living wall and the rooftop sculpture terrace even if you only have an hour.

Copper-clad museum in the middle of the park. The art is the draw, but ride up to the observation tower for a free 360 of the city, it's one of SF's best-kept views.

A neoclassical museum on the cliffs with a Rodin Thinker out front and the Pacific behind it. Worth the trek for the building alone.

One of the largest collections of Asian art in the West, in a grand old Beaux-Arts library off Civic Center. Quiet, vast, underrated.

A cluttered, beloved dive on a tiny alley, walls covered in maritime junk and decades of stories. Cash, characters, no pretense.

Rainforest dome, planetarium, aquarium, and a living roof under one Renzo Piano roof. Thursday NightLife turns it into a 21+ party.

Hands-on science as play, sprawling along the waterfront. Come on an adults-only After Dark night and rediscover being a curious kid.

Far more moving than it sounds: the life of Walt himself, told beautifully in a Presidio barracks. The hand-drawn early animation will get you.

One of the world's largest collections of working coin-operated antique arcade machines, still playable.

The first stand-alone museum of queer history in the U.S., with Harvey Milk's personal artifacts.

One of the few US museums devoted entirely to the preservation and exhibition of cartoon art.

A shrine to the Beat Generation with Kerouac's manuscripts, Ginsberg relics, and the car from the film of On the Road.