Look up ahead and slightly to your left-spot the tall, narrow, pale building with elaborate gothic details standing at the tip of the intersection like it’s about to stroll right across the street.
You’re now standing in front of Oakland’s one and only “Wedding Cake”-the Cathedral Building! Over a hundred years ago, in 1914, this marvelous Gothic Revival tower shot up above the city like a slice of New York’s Flatiron Building decided to come out west for some California sun. Designed by Benjamin Geer McDougall, its sharp, triangular shape is no accident-Telegraph Avenue and Broadway couldn’t agree which way to go, so the building squeezed right into the angle between them. Picture Oakland back in 1914: rattling streetcars, hats everywhere, and this futuristic skyscraper appearing like it was carved right out of a medieval dream. It was the first Gothic Revival skyscraper west of the Mississippi! Locals lovingly called it the Wedding Cake-though nobody’s tried to slice it yet, at least as far as I know. Peek up and you’ll see ornate spires and decorations, as if it’s wearing a crown. In 2015, the north wall got an upgrade-Bay Area artist Zio Ziegler painted a giant mural to honor the United Nations Charter, bringing fresh color and world history to the old stone. And get this: the third floor was featured as an apartment in the Oakland-based movie Sorry to Bother You. So while you’re gawking, just imagine all the stories stacked up in this tower, and the secrets it might be hiding behind each gothic window!
