Workers start to dismantle a large X logo on the roof of X headquarters on July 31, 2023 in San Francisco.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
At 9 a.m., SFGATE saw two workers in lifts detangling wires from the structure’s metal frame and pulling away its light-up panels. By noon, the large black X had vanished from the rooftop. The sign was up for less than three days, but that was plenty long enough for Musk to get up a viral video — and for X (formerly Twitter) representatives to twice deny a city inspector access to the Mid-Market rooftop.
An inspector visited the building both Friday and Saturday to check out the structure, which was built without a permit close to the edge of the 1355 Market St. roof, according to a July 28 note from the Department of Building Inspection. But he was turned away both times.
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After the X went up Friday, an inspector filed a complaint calling the sign “unsafe,” and the department opened an investigation into the metal assemblage. Erecting a sign atop a building requires a permit, like most sign changes, to ensure “consistency with the historic nature of the building” as well as safety, a department spokesperson told the Associated Press.
That day, Senior Building Inspector Mauricio Hernandez visited the headquarters and spoke with representatives from the social media company and building maintenance, he wrote in a filed comment. He said he explained the Building Inspection Division’s investigation process and requested access to the roof. A Twitter representative declined to let Hernandez up, he wrote, and said the X structure was a “temporary lighted sign for an event.”
Hernandez went again Saturday, the complaint tracker says, after conversations with the building’s property manager the day before. “However, upon arrival access was denied again by tenant,” Hernandez wrote.
That night, the X-obsessed Musk posted a video (now pinned atop his profile) of the X sign on the building, strobing with white light that reportedly beamed into the apartments of nearby residents.
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But those lights were the first to go Monday, as the workers in lifts pulled panels away from the black frame. The company’s old sign — which stuck out from the corner of the building on a white column with “@twitter” and the iconic blue bird logo — is now completely blank.
Hear of anything happening at X? Contact tech reporter Stephen Council securely at stephen.council@sfgate.com or on Signal at 628-204-5452.