The proposal includes a small boutique hotel to be called "The Maybeck," which will generate funds that pay for improvements to the Palace building while celebrating the Palace of Fine Arts design and legacy, including the work of its legendary architect, Bernard Maybeck. The hotel enhances the public's experience of a premiere public park setting.

"We look forward to working together with the Maybeck Center team and with the community to ensure that this iconic, historic resource is protected, preserved, and interpreted for generations to come," said Anthea Hartig, Ph. D., executive director and CEO, California Historical Society.

The Maybeck Center proposes a reuse of the property that will preserve and activate the building for future San Franciscans, while respecting the neighborhood setting and offering amenities to the site's existing visitor base, including a historic rehabilitation of the Palace of Fine Arts building connecting the magnificent exterior rotunda and colonnades for the first time to the building interior through a glazed, sky-lit visitor entrance and central dining court.

There will also be a full-service restaurant, bar and café offering high-quality local food and wines as well as picnic baskets for visitors to enjoy on the grounds. Shared bicycles, cars, on-demand transit and local shuttles to facilitate public access will be offered as well.

Mark Hornberger, Hornberger and Worstell, project architect and designer of renovations to the Ahwhanee Hotel in Yosemite and nationally recognized historic hotels, is the lead architect.

"We envision a project of the highest quality, worthy of the Palace's legacy. Our thoughtfully assembled team, including San Francisco's very own Exploratorium and the California Historical Society, is ideally suited to continue the heritage of the Palace of Fine Arts for generations to come," said Covarrubias.

TMG is also renovating a historical property in Oakland, CA, as previously reported.