On Geary street in San Francisco rises a huge and spectacular concrete structure that stands out from all the concrete structures around it in its bold architecture -  and its bolder purpose.  It’s full name is the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption. Unlike Alcatraz, every person who walks into St. Mary’s is not only considered worthy to be saved, but that exact purpose is the reason for the Cathedral’s existence.  While tons of concrete were poured to break the spirit of the men who occupied Alcatraz, each ton of concrete in St. Mary’s was poured to uplift the spirits of the people who enter and worship in this church.

The closest thing to bars you will see in St. Mary’s are the pipes of the organ.

As you enter St. Mary’s you really don’t know what to expect.  The outside is huge and startling and sterile and draws your eyes heavenward. The inside also draws your eyes up but it also combines warm wood with concrete to produce a surprisingly welcoming space. Yes, you feel dwarfed by the building (that’s intentional) but you’d don’t feel out of place. If anything, you feel an appropriate sense of proportion between God and man.

Many grottoes around the inside wall of the building contain large and daring sculptures highlighting events in the life of Mary.  These grottoes are surprisingly private in the grand scheme of the whole Cathedral and invite individual worship.

Your eyes can’t help but follow the stained glass up to the peak of the ceiling.  The metal canopy over the altar is called baldachin, which historically was a cloth canopy which covered an altar or throne for a dignitary, typically a head of state.  This metal baldachin stays true to the modern design but also follows tradition and allows an Archbishop or even the Pope to say mass in the Cathedral.

It would seem that the island of pipes would be the center of attention as you enter but that is not the case. With the proper lighting, the sanctuary and altar would draw your eye and the pipes would fade into shadow. The early morning I was there offered few lights and I had to rely on ambient light from the spotlights and the windows. I relied heavily on my 5D MK2 and its low light abilities. That and some fast prime lenses.

Speaking of pipes, here is how they were illuminated by that same ambient light. You can see the same shadows above the pipes in the previous picture. I promise you that there were no Photoshop tricks employed to get this effect.

The Tabernacle was HUGE, perhaps weighing more than a small church made of wood. In my opinion, the Cathedral was intentionally designed to distinguish the temporary from the eternal by its use of wood, metal and stone.

Speaking of intentional, even the smallest details were well blended into the cohesive sense of the Cathedral.  Notice here how the vertical lines of the wood (which echo the dramatic lines of the ceiling) are broken up by the horizontal arms of the cross. And again the elements of the detail juxtapose the permanence of metal with the temporal quality of wood.  These pieces are two of the  Stations of the Cross which ring the inside of the building.

Believe me, this a beautiful place to see (unlike Alcatraz) and a challenging one to shoot (like Alcatraz). Both St. Mary’s and Alcatraz were designed from the ground up to be made from tons of concrete but for two polar opposite purposes. St. Mary’s is dedicated to the hope of redemption while Alcatraz was designed to hold those deemed beyond hope. It was fascinating to me to see the lengths each would go to insure that its charter was honored, that its purpose was embodied in visible, tangible structures.