After being closed for two years because of the COVID-19 pandemic, San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral, the third largest Episcopal cathedral in the United States, has reopened to the public with an elevated visitor experience. The cathedral is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday to visitors.
The cathedral staff used the time of the closure to evaluate and reimagine Grace through the eyes of the over 70,000 people who visit the cathedral every year during non-service hours. After much planning and discussion with the community of Grace, as well as the many visitors of the cathedral and arts professionals, Grace has installed the first of many professionally curated visitor experiences to help visitors appreciate the architecture, artifacts, artistic offerings and history of the cathedral.
“We’ve spent countless hours developing interactive self-guided and docent-led tours so that every visitor can really go deep into the history of Grace Cathedral and understand how it’s been the center of so many important cultural, civic and spiritual movements in San Francisco, the country and even the world,” said the Very Rev. Malcolm Clemens Young, ThD, Dean of Grace Cathedral. “We hope that everyone leaves here with the sense of awe and wonder that we have every day, and that they’ll know that Grace is a home for them, no matter their faith, nationality, race or age.”
In fall 2021, the cathedral hired museum membership expert Julie Knight to bring the vision of the robust visitor experience to life.
“It’s been extremely fulfilling to take my experiences from the museum world and apply them to such a beautiful and significant place as Grace Cathedral. We have worked to develop relevant and engaging content on each of the stops on the tour. We hope this will help every visitor grow to appreciate this wonderful place as much as those of us who work here every day do,” said Julie Knight, director of cultural membership and visitor experience at Grace Cathedral.
The new visitor experience will take sightseers through a Highlights Tour, the first of many themed experiences. The Highlights Tour features 18 artifacts in 12 professionally curated touch screen stops, bringing each station to life with unique interactive digital experiences
Visitors can experience the tour in self-guided or docent-led formats. Two more themed tours will be available this summer; others are planned for 2023. Each tour will feature different aspects of the cathedral so visitors can return time and time again and learn something new with every visit.
