Though the central focus of Slow Food Nation is food and the people and places that enable us to eat—farms and farmers, artisans and bakers, urban gardens and policymakers—this year’s event also boasts incredible architecture and design from some of the best firms in the Bay Area. Thanks to the talents and dedication of this esteemed group, visitors to Slow Food Nation will enjoy delicious food and hear stimulating conversations inside beautiful, sustainable structures designed specifically for this event.

As you wander between the sessions at Fort Mason and Civic Center, you’ll see 22 different stations and temporary buildings designed for SFN. In Civic Center, Craig Hartman of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill designed the Soap Box stage, which has already been erected near the Victory Garden, and will soon provide a platform for community members to voice their ideas in a public space. Nearby, the compost exhibit, designed by a team from IDEO, features an interactive learning station and bricks of compost for visitors to take home. Bright orange shipping containers have been salvaged and redesigned by Jensen Architects as the welcoming booths for both venues—you’ll be able to identify them from afar by the giant windmills that will stand atop the roof.

Over in Fort Mason, if the Taste Pavilions don’t attract you on scent alone, they will surely draw attention for their forms, materials, and the innovative use of design to address the events taking place in side. The bread pavilion, for example, by Stanley Saitowitz of Natoma Architects, had to accommodate two tandoori ovens, two pizza ovens, and a commercial deck oven, in addition to display areas and bakery counters. A series of tall scaffolding systems keeps the pavilion open to the outside and lets the breads take center stage.