There’s a Space Age hotel right here in San Francisco with the world’s largest hotel lobby, and you’ve probably walked past it a million times without realizing what you were missing on the inside. We wouldn’t blame you for not knowing, though, as the Hyatt Regency’s two entrances are somewhat hidden. Although the hotel sits at the foot of Market Street, the main entrance is tucked away on Drumm Street, and the secondary entrance can be lost amidst the tangle of Justin Herman Plaza and the Vaillancourt Fountain.
Once inside, you’ll definitely feel your eyebrows raise and your jaw drop, because the lobby is truly spectacular—and indeed the world’s largest hotel lobby according to the Guinness Book of World Records. The asymmetrical open space, designed by architect John C. Portman, Jr. in 1973, could double as the docking station for some otherworldly zeppelin. It stretches 170 feet into the air, is 350 feet long and 160 feet wide, and makes you feel like the main character in a James Bond movie set on another planet. If you down a cocktail here while the capsule elevators made of glass ascend and descend silently around you, your imagination will insist that someone’s got a wild new piece of technology tucked inside their embossed cigarette case.
That vibe’s not accidental. Portman loved science fiction, says Rob Ferguson, the hotel’s director of sales and marketing. In fact, the 1936 H.G. Wells film Things to Come inspired Portman to design a futuristic building (watch the trailer at the film’s IMDB page to see a shot of an interior that bears a striking resemblance to the hotel’s atrium).
A space of that size also requires some futuristic infrastructure. Ferguson says that “before technology caught up with architecture, it takes a lot of work to cool or warm a space of this magnitude,” and that the team is still trying to “figure out what we can invest in to reduce our carbon footprint.” The hotel is “constantly working to take a building no one really designs anymore and enhance its uniqueness and celebrate it,” he says.
At the time of its 1973 opening, an ad in the Oakland Tribune read, “It’s a heptagon. It’s a lobby 18 stories high. It’s crystal bubble elevators. It’s a lounge that turns 360 degrees to show you San Francisco. It’s breakfast on a balcony overlooking Telegraph Hill. It’s fettuccini served from roving pasta carts.” An article in the Press-Telegram (based in Long Beach, which would soon get its own nearby Portman-designed hotel with the labyrinthian Westin Bonaventure) from that year reveals that in the lobby there was a sunken area called the Other Trellis. “There, seated on red egg-shaped lounge chairs or the red sofas which rim the pit, guests are served drinks at plastic lighted cylindrical tables” and that cages of white doves were hung from bay trees in the lobby. There was once a “babbling brook” near the elevators. It truly must’ve been an incredible sight to witness the $50 million building when it first opened (in 2022, the hotel spent $55 million in renovations, exceeding the original construction cost). The massive 35-foot-high geometric sculpture Eclipse by Charles Perry is still in place today. The curving white tile patterns that grace the hotel (and also read as futuristic) were hand-placed piece by piece. “Today, it would blow your budget. We can’t do things like that,” says Ferguson.
Over the years, the hotel’s been featured in several films: 1974’s The Towering Inferno, 1977’s High Anxiety and 1979’s Time After Time.
I remember, as many do, dining years ago in the rotating restaurant at the top of the hotel, the Equinox. In April 2024, the turntable of fabulousness was revived after 17 dormant years, but unfortunately it’s currently only open to overnight guests who book a Regency Club guest room. It’s worth it to reserve a room at that price point just to gain access to the incredible views from the club, which completes a full rotation in just under an hour. You feel part of San Francisco’s history in that aerie that overlooks one of the best views of the waterfront you can find. Today’s in-house restaurant is called the Eclipse and sits in the lobby with demi-walls. The food is excellent—and the cocktails even more so. I loved the Bay Breeze Mojito with Bacardi Superior, blueberries, mint, sloe gin, lime and club soda.
Outside, the hotel rewards looking at it from all sides, and in fact one of the most interesting vantage points is from fairly far away. Walk north down the Embarcadero for a block and then look back. You’ll see the slanted roof of the atrium in a way that’s usually hidden by the cluster of Embarcadero Center. The Embarcadero buildings are themselves worthy of coverage as one of the largest mixed-use complexes in the Western U.S., built over 15 years from 1968 to 1983 (they’re the ones that are lit up like presents at night). These were also designed by Portman and carry forward the white tile work and create a pleasant space to wander through bridges and skydecks, but unfortunately many of the businesses inside are shuttered. Feather River Bulletin columnist Ev Bey wrote of the hotel in 1975: “The exterior looks like a giant typewriter that someone threw off the nearby Embarcadero Skyway.” It’s a hilarious comparison, and now a dated one, too—that skyway collapsed during the Loma Prieta earthquake.
My family and I would wander into the hotel and ramble around anytime we were in the neighborhood, but in more recent years you can’t board the Willy Wonka-esque elevators without a room key. So you might have to pony up for an overnight stay—and you should, because it’s a legend of a hotel. I was fortunate enough to stay there recently, and here are a few insights I gleaned from my visit. For starters, ask for a room on the waterfront side to get bay and bridge views, although the Market Street facing rooms also give a decent city views. Because of the stepped architecture, every room has a balcony.
Such a vast atrium provides a bit of a situation for guests in the rooms that line that open space, especially if you’re far from the elevator bank as I was. Depending on where your room is, you may face a bit of a hike. But it’s all worth it. I’d rather walk farther to have an extraordinary experience peering down at the floor far below than have a short walk down a mundane hotel hallway. It really is fun to ride the glass elevators and get an amazing vantage point down into the atrium as you whisk upward. My room faced the water and was pleasingly contemporary inside with a good amount of space. I liked going out onto the balcony to watch boats go by.
Finally, it’s worth noting that the hotel is steps from the Ferry Building and its culinary offerings and bookstore, as well as the Embarcadero streetcars. It’s about a 15 minute walk to the Front Street Entertainment Zone and a half hour to Pier 39, Fisherman’s Wharf and Pier 33’s ferry to Alcatraz.