Boom cycle

The Big Four (Nob Hill)

RESTAURANTS • First Word

The Skinny: If you’re looking for old money in SF, try the top of Nob Hill, where the Huntington Hotel opened in 1924 during San Francisco’s third cycle of bust and boom. Its Big Four restaurant followed in 1976, during boom five, and both borrow names from the founders of the Central Pacific Railroad, robber barons whose narrative arcs have been replicated across SF’s history ever since. After a long pandemic closure, change in ownership, and deep renovation, the hotel and its restaurant reopened in March, the latter back as a glorious steakhouse that channels the Gilded Age of California.