Berkeley Zen Center

For the Thai temple in Tampa, see Wat Mongkolratanaram, Tampa Wat Mongkolratanaram (Thai: วัดมงคลรัตนาราม) is a small Thai Buddhist temple located in Berkeley, California. A wat, it mainly attracts Thai American Buddhists, many of whom are students at the University of California, Berkeley, but it also draws in many local, non-Buddhists who come searching for the authentic Thai food public brunch on Sundays or attend its frequent cultural events. The temple is home to a Thai school for San Francisco Bay Area youth, as well as Berkeley's Thai Cultural Center.In 2001, it marked 25 years of being a temple by completing renovations to its Victorian -era building to adapt the architecture to temple style.In February 2009, a group of neighbors sought to shut down the Sunday public brunch, citing litter and traffic. The Zoning Adjustments Board of Berkeley voted 8 to 1 to keep the Sunday brunch, and the board chair "praised the temple for being a positive influence" in the neighborhood. The brunch runs on donations; visitors pay for tokens and exchange them for dishes.The Thai-born Ajahn Manat is the current abbot of Wat Mongkolratanaram. In 1997 the Wat was home to the East Bay chapter of the Cypherpunks.

The Shotgun Players is a California East Bay regional theatre group located in Berkeley, California. It runs 6 to 7 productions per season. Its main stage is the Ashby Stage located in the Lorin District near the Ashby BART station.

Ashby is a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station located beneath Adeline Street to the south of its intersection with Ashby Avenue in South Berkeley of Berkeley, California. The station includes park-and-ride facilities with 715 automobile parking spaces in two separate parking lots.

The Rainbow Sign was an African-American cultural center in Berkeley, California, that operated from 1971 to 1977. Future Vice President of the United States Kamala Harris frequently attended the center as a child, and described it as influential on her.The Guardian stated that "Rainbow Sign was a little bit of everything to the black community.... The space provided discounted meals to children, staged concerts for Nina Simone and held book signings for Maya Angelou and Alice Walker."

The San Francisco Institute of Architecture (SFIA) was founded in 1990 by Fred A. Stitt, architect, as a school devoted to innovation in design and experimental research and reform in architectural education. Its goal: to offer a new kind of architectural education, grounded in nature-based architecture and sustainable design. The school was co founded by Lou Marines, former CEO of the national American Institute of Architects. A year later Marines left SFIA to pursue independent continuing education professional development programs. The SFIA is not accredited by the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB).Prior to SFIA, Fred Stitt taught for three years at UC Berkeley, where he studied and documented problems and potential reforms in architectural education. He previously conducted the same kind of research on all aspects of architectural practice at various architecture firms. The results were presented over time in 18 books authored by Stitt and published by McGraw-Hill, John Wiley & Sons, and others. He also created and published over 70 architectural manuals through his own publishing company, Guidelines. The most recent textbook produced by Fred Stitt, The Ecological Design Handbook, was published by McGraw-Hill and recently translated into Chinese, and is used as a university textbook around the world. Stitt and SFIA's distinguished faculty are now applying extended problem seeking and creative problem solving to every aspect of contemporary sustainable architecture. In pursuit of this work, SFIA created the first major national and international green building conferences (the Eco Wave Series) and has held recurring workshops for design professionals and educators in over 50 cities across the U.S. Since 1997 SFIA has provided low-cost distance learning programs to architecture and engineering students and professionals in every state in the U.S. and on every continent around the world. Today, SFIA is the world's oldest and largest green building school in the world. In 2007 SFIA relocated to Berkeley, California. SFIA plans to eventually establish onsite programs in additional cities. In 2008 SFIA introduced a new program--"Universal Green"—which will ultimately offer universal online education on every aspect of architecture and green building, at no cost to anyone, anywhere—whoever wants it.

La Peña Cultural Center or La Peña for short, is a multicultural center in the United States. It was founded in 1975 by Latin American and Californian allies in Berkeley, California in response to the 1973 coup d'état in Chile, or golpe de estado. The center was a focal point for the opposition-in-exile to dictator Augusto Pinochet during his rule, and later evolved into a nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote peace, social justice and community action through cultural arts, education and community action. La Peña is located at 3105 Shattuck Avenue in the Ashby neighborhood of South Berkeley, California

The White Horse Inn is a gay bar located at 6551 Telegraph Avenue in Oakland's Bushrod Park neighborhood. It officially opened in 1933 but is rumored to have operated as a gay speakeasy since before the end of Prohibition. It is said to be the oldest continuously operating gay bar in the United States, along with Cafe Lafitte in New Orleans, Louisiana which has also operated since 1933. The White Horse is situated geographically near the Oakland-Berkeley border and in close proximity to the University of California, Berkeley campus.

The South Berkeley Community Church is a historic church at 1802 Fairview Street in Berkeley, California. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.It was designed by architect Hugo W. Storch in a Mission/Spanish Revival style to serve as the Park Congregational Church. It was built in 1943.

The Lorin District (also known as the Lorin Streetcar District) is a neighborhood located in the southern part of Berkeley, California, bounded by Ashby Avenue to the north, Adeline Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Way to the east, Sacramento Street to the west, and 62nd Street to the south. It was formerly the unincorporated town or settlement of Lorin, the last stop before Berkeley along the Berkeley Branch line of the Central Pacific (later, Southern Pacific). In 1892, the people of Lorin elected to be annexed to the City of Berkeley. Today, the area is today mostly referred to as "South Berkeley". Lorin is the setting for a scene in former University of California student Frank Norris' book The Octopus (1903).

Boone's University School is a historic building at 2029 Durant Avenue in Berkeley, California, U.S. It is the last surviving building from the Boone's University School for Boys, which closed in 1915. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places since November 1, 1982; listed as a California Historical Landmark since November 1, 1982; and listed as a Berkeley Landmark since March 16, 1981.Since 2000, the building has been home to the Persian Center, a cultural and heritage organization for the Iranian diaspora and Iranian Americans.

The Jabberwock was an American folk music club and coffeehouse active from 1961 to 1967, and located in Berkeley, California. It became among the most popular venues in the area's folk movement thanks to Bill "Jolly Blue" Ehlert. It stood at the corner of Telegraph Avenue and Russell Street, and featured several notable artists. The club was particularly frequented by pre-groups formed by future members of Country Joe and the Fish. The building was demolished two years after the business's closing.

Corder Building, is a historical English Cottage building in downtown Berkeley, California. The Corder brick building was built in 1900. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 11, 1982. The Classical revival building was designed by James W. Plachek. James W. Plachek designed a number of other buildings in Berkeley, including: Berkeley Public Library, New Hotel Carquinez, UC Theatre, Chamber of Commerce Building, schools, and civic buildings. Architect James W. Plachek office was is the Heywood Building. he Corder Building has been updated and is now the Shattuck Apartments on the upper floors and a pharmacy on the ground floor.