The Contemporary Jewish Museum is itself a symbol dedicated to the history and revitalization of Jewish life in San Francisco. Housed in the abandoned late 19th-century Jessie Street Power Substation, updated in the first decade of the 20th century by Willis Polk, and landmarked in 1976, the museum makes visible relationships between new and old, between tradition and innovation, bringing together 19th, 20th and 21st century architecture into one building.

The CJM’s design is based on the H...