Chinatown

About Chinatown

San Francisco’s Chinatown is the oldest in North America and one of the largest outside Asia. About 15,000 people live in roughly 30 square blocks, mostly in SRO hotels and walk-up apartments above the storefronts. The neighborhood has been the commercial and residential center of Chinese American life on the West Coast since the 1850s.

The buildings you see today are the 1906 rebuild. The 1906 fire destroyed the original wooden Chinatown, and city officials proposed relocating the neighborhood to Hunters Point. Merchant leader Look Tin Eli commissioned the architectural firm Ross and Burgren to rebuild the blocks in a style the press at the time called “oriental”: pagoda rooflines, painted balconies, ornamental lampposts. The intent was to draw tourism and investment to keep the neighborhood in place. Almost every building on Grant Avenue and Stockton Street dates from 1907 through 1909.

How to Walk Chinatown

Grant Avenue is the touristy street. Enter at the Dragon Gate at Grant and Bush. Grant has souvenir shops, English-language restaurants, and the pagoda-roof architecture from the 1906 rebuild. Grant runs north past Jack Kerouac Alley, crosses Columbus Avenue, and continues into North Beach.

Stockton Street, one block west, is the community oriented street. Produce markets stack vegetables on the sidewalk; fishmongers keep tanks of live tilapia and Dungeness crab. The street is at full operation by about 7 AM. Good Mong Kok Bakery at 1039 Stockton sells grab-and-go char siu bao; cash only.

The alleys between Grant and Stockton. Ross Alley runs parallel to the two main streets and holds the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory, where workers fold cookies by hand. Waverly Place, one block south, is the Street of Painted Balconies and the location of the Tin How Temple. Spofford Alley was a center of the tong-era conflicts of the 1880s and is now quiet and residential.

Portsmouth Square at Kearny and Clay is the neighborhood’s main public space. Older men play xiangqi on stone tables; tai chi groups gather on the upper plaza in the early morning. The square was the original town square of San Francisco. (as of 6/12/26 its closed and getting renovated)

What to Know Before You Go

Produce markets on Stockton are at full speed by 7 AM.  Shops on Grant open around 10ish and close by 5 or 6pm.

Parking garages exist under Portsmouth Square and St. Mary’s Square; on-street parking is impossible.

The alleys are public walkways. Ross, Waverly, Spofford, Beckett, and Ping Yuen are all walkable.

Filmed in Chinatown

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47 productions filmed around Chinatown, oldest first.

1927The Jazz SingerCoffee Dan's1941The Maltese FalconBurritt Alley1947The Lady from ShanghaiFormer Hall of Justice1950Woman on the RunFormer Hall of Justice1958VertigoErnie's Restaurant1961Flower Drum SongChinatown1969Take the Money and RunBank of America1971Dirty HarryPortsmouth Square1972What’s Up Doc?Chinatown1973Magnum ForceBroadway Tunnel1974Freebie and the BeanStockton Tunnel1978Invasion of the Body SnatchersChinatown1979Time After TimeOld St. Mary's Church1982Chan is MissingLi Po1985Dim Sum: A Little Bit of HeartChinatown1985A View to a KillChinatown1988The PresidioWashington Street & Waverly Place1988The Dead PoolPortsmouth Square1988Patty HearstBank of America1990Pacific HeightsChinatown+27more on recordEvery film shot in San Francisco →