I spent an hour inside San Francisco’s most architecturally sublime yet extravagant government building Unless you’re an attorney, you probably haven’t paid a visit, and it’s your loss: The staid granite exterior hides an effusion of materiality and craftsmanship, layer upon layer of deep-carved delight from a time when government was willing and able to pull out all the stops. It’s an artifact from a long-gone era of imperial democracy and seemingly limitless resources, a federal outpost where the decorative marble columns in one courtroom look like caramel streaked with fudge. The arched hallways with vaulted ceilings would be at home in a Florentine palace. The bronze elevator cage is emblazoned with not one but two seals of the United States, a third regal eagle perched between them for good measure.