Salesforce Tower vs The Avery Building

Comparing the Salesforce Tower and the The Avery Building is interesting because they both stand in San Francisco, CA, and were completed just one year apart, but they were designed by different architects.

This offers a unique glimpse at how rival designers approached projects in the same city during the same era.

The Salesforce Tower is clearly the larger tower of the two, both in terms of height and number of floors. It rises to 1070ft (326m) with 61 floors above ground, while the The Avery Building reaches 617ft (188m) with 56 floors above ground.

Of course, each project may have faced different briefs or regulatory constraints, which we don't really know about and could also explain the outcome.

Both the Salesforce Tower and the The Avery Building were designed in line with the aesthetic conventions of the Contemporary style.

At the time, this style was at the height of its popularity. So both Pelli Clark & Partners and OMA followed what was in many ways expected of them, producing designs that fit comfortably within contemporary architectural norms, rather than breaking with convention.

The Salesforce Tower is primarily commercial, while the The Avery Building is primarily residential.

The The Avery Building offers 548 residential units.

The The Avery Building also provides 218 parking spaces.

The two towers rely on different structural systems, reflecting distinct engineering strategies.

The Salesforce Tower uses a Framed Tube In Tube structural system, which combines a strong central core with a perimeter tube of columns, while the The Avery Building uses a Frame system, that relies on a regular grid of columns and beams to sustain its weight.

Yet, when it comes to their facade, they both employed the same solution, a Curtain Wall facade.

A curtain wall is a non-load-bearing facade hung from the structural frame. It is anchored to floor slabs and transfers only its own weight and wind loads, allowing for sleek, glassy exteriors.