The museum opened in 1895 as an outgrowth of the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894 ( a fair modeled on the Chicago World 's Columbian Exposition of the previous year ) . It was housed in an Egyptian revival structure which had been the Fine Arts Building at the fair . The building was badly damaged in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake , and was closed for a year and a half for repairs . Before long , the museum 's steady development called for a new space to better serve its growing audiences . Michael de Young responded by planning the building that would serve as the core of the de Young facility through the 20th century . Louis Christian Mullgardt , the coordinator for architecture for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition , designed the Spanish-Plateresque-style building . The new structure was completed in 1919 and formally transferred by de Young to the city 's park commissioners . In 1921 , de Young added a central section , together with a tower that would become the museum 's signature feature , and the museum began to assume the basic configuration that it retained until 2001 . Michael de Young 's great efforts were honored with the changing of the museum 's name to the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum . Another addition , a west wing , was completed in 1925 , the year de Young died . In 1929 the original Egyptian-style building was declared unsafe and demolished . By 1949 , the elaborate cast concrete ornamentation of the original de Young was determined to be a hazard and removed because the salt air from the Pacific had rusted the supporting steel
1906 San Francisco earthquake
1906 San Francisco earthquake
De Young Museum