SOMA, SO NEW; SAN FRANCISCO NEIGHBORHOOD HAS BEEN REVITALIZED BY THE TECHIES.

Byline: Eric Noland Travel Editor

The woman had the bearing and speech of a broker. She sat in the lobby of the new W San Francisco Hotel, across from two young men in open-collar shirts, neither of whom looked old enough to shave.

A snippet of her remarks, overheard: ``Now, what we're going to be doing next is seeing if we can take that $28 million figure down to something a little more reasonable.''

Incredibly, this scene was played out recently in the area of the city known as South of Market.

Longtime visitors to San Francisco probably won't recognize the place today. A neighborhood that for so many years had been a tired warehouse district, overrun with hard-luck stories and the people who tell them, has undergone a startling transformation.

SoMa - as San Franciscans call it - is now sprouting hotels, restaurants, gourmet coffee shops and entertainment options in new or dramatically renovated buildings, and tourists and business people are rediscovering an area that they formerly approached with combat-zone trepidation.

The revitalization is being fueled by Internet commerce - newly launched dot-com companies, as they are called. They are predominantly owned and operated by 20-somethings who prefer the city to the boondocks but don't want to be creamed by the legendarily high rents in other parts of San Francisco.

``This is Software Gulch,'' said cab driver Gary Teele as he wheeled south on Fourth Street one recent weekday afternoon. ``Property is gold down here. My daughter bought a condo here two years ago. Less than 1,000 square feet. Paid $198,000. She just sold it the other day for $320,000.''

The infusion of high-tech cash has spawned numerous businesses seeking to capture some of it, but this is not your parents' urban renewal. These new tenants are right out of college, where they learned that you can sit at a computer in a dorm room and be enormously productive while attired in T-shirt, sweat pants, socks, sandals and green hair. They brazenly reject the traditional standards of business decorum.

On the streets at rush hour, you see them streaming to their places of employ, riding bikes, lugging backpacks or soft briefcases, talking on cell phones or getting lost in whatever is pouring out of their portable CD-player headphones. It's all loose-fitting clothing and sensible shoes. A tie or a dress is a rarity, a suit unheard of.

And the SoMa world that has sprung up around them appears to be tapped directly into this.

At the W Hotel, which sits catty-corner to the Moscone Convention Center, the staff members are attired entirely in black (no ties, of course) and wear wireless headsets to remain in constant communication with one another - as if that is critically important. (``Ash tray needs cleaning at fifth-floor elevator. Over.'')

The guest rooms are equipped with Web TV (Internet access $9.95 per day), wireless keyboards, cordless phones and data ports. A button on the phone reads ``Whatever Whenever,'' and if you punch it up, you don't hear some stuffy adult say, ``Guest Services''; a young voice actually says, ``Whatever Whenever.''

There is no do-not-disturb sign on the door. Instead, the card says, ``Leave Me Alone (Please).''

Traditional names are rejected, such that the lobby is not called the lobby. It's the living room, and it kind of feels like one - an extremely modern one. It's done in black and chrome and frosted glass and track lighting and Star Trek-style furniture. Music throbs through the scene at all hours, a curious amalgam of techno pop, fusion jazz, dance mix.

It's as if someone has attempted to obliterate the mold of the traditional downtown hotel. No brass and country-club furnishings. No stuffiness. No doorman out front in a funny fuzzy hat.

And it's refreshing, really. This is an extremely stylish hotel, with the kind of room furnishings and appointments you might choose for your own home (given a great deal of latitude in the budget). Most of the items are, in fact, for sale. (Chenille bed cover, $55. Tree in container, $90. Soap dish, $10.)

Head out onto the street, duck west through immaculate Yerba Buena Gardens, and you'll find where SoMa's new devotees go to let off steam in techie bliss.

It's Sony Metreon, a four-level, 350,000-square-foot enterprise that opened in June at Mission and Fourth streets. Not really a mall, though it feels like one. Not really a theme park, though it feels like one of those, too. The preferred description is urban entertainment center, and this one puts a fine hone on the term cutting edge.

Just about everything here is interactive, it seems, and you can hardly turn a corner without being confronted by some sort of Sony product - all combining to prompt a singular response: Hmm, maybe I'm due for an upgrade.

And why just look when you can touch? Microsoft, following the direct-retail lead of Nike and other companies, has a store in which customers can take software out of the box and try it at any number of handy PCs. There are also Internet stations available.

PlayStation has a store in which various new titles can be tried out on one of 30 gaming stations. Sony, not surprisingly, has its own direct-retail outlet. The Discovery Channel has a store that includes exhibits both educational and, of course, interactive.

The complex breaks from mall tradition in that it is not anchored by department stores but by movie theaters - 15 screens featuring nearly 4,000 stadium-style seats, plus a 600-seat IMAX theater that features some films in 3-D.

There are also eight bistro-style restaurants, several intended to provide a taste of San Francisco: Firewood Cafe, LongLife Noodle Co.

But the real lure of Metreon can be found in its fun and games, which on a recent visit seemed to be appealing not only to young adults and children, but to baby boomers who find no shame in an occasional lapse into regressive behavior.

The designers of Metreon were convinced that sophisticated San Franciscans abhor cheesy entertainment themes and characters, so two of the playgrounds were inspired by the works of writers.

The best such example is a fourth-floor attraction called Where the Wild Things Are, based on the work of acclaimed children's author and artist Maurice Sendak.

This is the stuff of sweet dreamland for the age 3-to-7 set, and the best part is that you get to participate, not just watch. Pull a lever near a balcony railing and a fuzzy bird descends rapidly toward the startled people below, halting at the last instant as it reaches the end of its leash. Swing on a rope and manipulate the facial features of an enormous wild-eyed character. Step on a footprint in a narrow, dark passage and hear a voice exclaim overhead - or, better yet, hear one of those bodily noises your parents tell you you're not supposed to laugh at.

Climb on stuff. Crawl through things. Build structures with big, soft blocks. Stomp on characters' heads as they pop up from holes in the floor. The beauty of this place - and perhaps the reason it's so popular with the youngsters - is that unlike at home, kids are actually encouraged to touch, pull, climb and kick.

At the exit, it's not unusual to hear hysterical screaming - from some tyke being led away from this place far too soon.

Try to calm things down in the gift store. Wow, what a concept: This shop trades almost exclusively in books. Here is an exhaustive selection of Sendak's works, plus the excellent children's literature of such authors as H.A. Rey and Robert McCloskey.

Kids a little older, who may have found Wild Things a bit on the dumb side, might be more drawn to The Way Things Work, an attraction on the second floor based on David Macaulay's best seller of the same name.

In a reception area, a robot interacts directly with the audience, to the delight of kids. Then it's into an auditorium where a 3-D film provides Macaulay's clever take on the technology of everyday life: levers, wedges, pulleys, zippers.

Kids giggle as they follow the exploits of a hapless woolly mammoth, and they squeal as animated items ``fly'' into the audience. This could be the sensory theater of the future. As an internal-combustion engine rumbles to life, there is vibration in the seats. As the mammoth sprays the audience with his trunk, mist descends from above.

In accordance with the shortened attention spans of the day, the program is over in a flash. And the audience, yet again, exits through a gift store hawking books, CD-ROMs, erector sets, silly toys.

For the next age bracket - teens to young 20s - there is Airtight Garage, an enormous video arcade (Metreon prefers the term adventure zone), also on the second floor, which delves into the world of French graphic novelist Jean ``Moebius'' Giraud.

Quaternia? Badlands? They're here. So is Savage Quest. The concept: You're in control of an on-screen tyrannosaur, which is alternately attacked by smaller dinosaurs, cave men with spears and one dastardly triceratops. Get this: Your charge has to eat meat to maintain strength, which means repeatedly devouring critters and the cave men - also their terrified, fleeing women. A few minutes into the game, and the entire scene is a bloody mess. Here's hoping no maladjusted teen-agers are hooked on this one.

A less gruesome alternative might be HyperBowl, which seems to have particular appeal to older customers - the joystick-challenged, if you will. As a scene plays out on an enormous screen, participants manipulate a large, bowling-ball-like control and knock down pins in any number of unlikely locales: the streets of San Francisco, the heaving deck of a sailing ship, ancient Rome. (Watch out for that priceless urn . . . too late.)

For $17 - $13 for kids under 12 and seniors - you can gain admission to Where the Wild Things Are and The Way Things Work and also get a number of credit points for Airtight Garage. Each attraction can also be purchased separately.

At Metreon, you won't see a lot of cash changing hands. That's kind of passe for this crowd. Here, the magnetic strip reigns supreme. Swipe your credit card to buy a pass to an attraction, and you'll be issued a card that you'll then swipe at a different machine to gain entry. Use your credit card at Airtight Garage to get a video game card, and feed that into the machine to play; the machine will keep track of your credit points. Avoid the lines at the movie theater ticket counter by feeding your credit card into an ATM-like machine and specifying how many tickets you want, for which movie, at which time.

Fortunately, no scanning device is used to exit the place.

After the nonstop sensory assault that is Metreon, you'll probably welcome the fresh air and serenity of Yerba Buena Gardens, which lies directly east of the Sony monstrosity. It is neatly clipped grass, fountains, shady trees, benches and no bums.

If your kids are still wired, check out the Rooftop at the Moscone Center, which includes Zeum, an interactive arts and technology museum for young people. There's a glassed-in carousel up there, too.

For a clean break from things that celebrate noise and motion, however, there is the Museum of Modern Art, next door to the W Hotel on Third. The museum presents a serene environment for contemplation - contemplation of what qualifies for art in some quarters.

You can gaze at three panels painted solid white, by Robert Rauschenberg, praised by a contemporary as ``airports for lights, shadows and particles.'' OK.

In another exhibition room is a urinal lying on its side on a pedestal, a work created by Marcel Duchamp. An explanatory placard reads: ``By removing the urinal from its everyday context, Duchamp created a new thought and a new identity for it.'' Right.

The placards on the walls of the Museum of Modern Art actually do a commendable job of tracing the emergence of modern art, from the first tentative forays of Henri Matisse and Andre Derain in the early 1900s - theAy were labeled ``wild beasts'' by critics - to a Max Beckmann oil from 1938, ``Woman at Her Toilette With Red and White Lilies,'' a work that resulted in his being labeled a ``degenerate'' by Nazis who were coming to power in prewar Germany.

The boom of San Francisco's South of Market district is likely to continue. Pacific Bell Park, to be the new home of baseball's Giants and targeted to open with the 2000 season in April, will help see to that. It is currently taking shape in red-brick splendor at Third and King streets. Already, bar-and-grill establishments with leafy patio areas are springing up nearby.

What happened to the old SoMa? It simply moved slightly west. Wander down Folsom and you'll find a transition zone after you cross Fifth Street. Here, renovation projects muscle for dominance with auto-repair shops, X-rated businesses and tattered gospel missions. A bit farther on, walls are scarred with graffiti, air is acrid with urine.

Not long ago, this blight engulfed the Moscone Center and its neighborhood. In fact, local business people would warn their convention colleagues to catch a cab at the door, beat it back to their city-center hotels and not risk even a half-block walk in the perilous zone that was South of Market.

No more, though. Not since the tech crowd arrived and began infusing the area with its money, its energy, its perspective.

Not since SoMa became so different.

end

If you go

GETTING THERE: Pave paradise, put up a parking lot . . . then tear out the parking lot, put up a building. The South of Market redevelopment boom is gobbling up open space fast, such that parking availability is shriveling and rates are soaring. It might be best to come in from the airport by taxi or, better yet, Caltrain: [phone]; Web: www.transitinfo.org/Caltrain. If you must drive in, there is a 2,585-space parking garage directly west of Sony Metreon; it takes up an entire block of Mission Street between Fourth and Fifth streets (fees graduated to a daily maximuAm of $13).

COSTS: At Sony Metreon, you can gain admission to Where the Wild Things Are and The Way Things Work and get some play time on the video games of Airtight Garage for $17 for adults, $13 for seniors and children under 12. Wild Things and Way Things Work can be bought separately. Admission for each is $7 for adults, $5 for seniors and kids. Admission to the IMAX features is $9.75. For Zeum, at the Moscone Convention Center, admission is $7 for adults, $6 for seniors and students, $5 for kids ages 5 to 18. The carousel costs $1 to ride. Admission for the Museum of Modern Art is $9 for adults, $6 for seniors, $5 for students with ID (children 12 and under free).

LODGING: The W San Francisco, a trendy, high-tech hotel at Third and Howard streets, shatters the mold of the conventional downtown business hotel. The Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide property is impeccably appointed throughout, however, and has some terrific views of the Bay Bridge. Standard rates: $289 to $319. Phone: [phone]. Web: www.whotels.com. Another option in the South of Market area is the just-opened Palomar Hotel at Fourth and Market, [phone] or [phone]. There is a Marriott at Fourth and Mission, [phone] or [phone]. A Four Seasons is under construction on Market between Third and Fourth, due for completion in 2003. The city's visitors' bureau maintains a hotel referral line: [phone].

DINING: In this city of great eats, why confine yourself to a particular neighborhood? In the South of Market area, XYZ, at the W Hotel, offers nine starter courses and six entrees (the usuals: fish, lamb, beef), but a recent dinner was not found to be particularly memorable. A better idea might be to jump in a cab and head across town to PlumpJack Cafe, 3127 Fillmore St., [phone]. For lunch, it's tough to beat the shellfish at the delightfully casual and friendly Swan Oyster Depot, 1517 Polk St., [phone].

INFORMATION: Contact the San Francisco Convention & Visitors Bureau at (800) A220-5747 or [phone]. Web: www.sfvisitor.org. For Sony Metreon information, call [phone]. Web: www.metreon.com. For the Museum of Modern Art, call [phone].

CAPTION(S):

5 photos, box, map

PHOTO (1 -- 3 -- color) San Francisco's once-seedy South of Market district is in the midst of a radical transformation, as reflected in a gleaming new skyline. At the heart of the rebirth is Sony Metreon, a high-tech entertainment center. Where the Wild Things Are, an interactive wonderland for kids, is on the top floor of Metreon.

(4) Yerba Buena Gardens is a quiet, well-maintained retreat in the middle of San Francisco's South of Market area. Standing sentry over it is the distinctive roof of the Museum of Modern Art.

(5) Pacific Bell Park, the future home of baseball's Giants, anchors the

lower edge of San Francisco's South of Market redevelopment. It is expected to be completed by the start of the baseball season next April.

Eric Noland/Staff Photographer

BOX: If you go (see text)

MAP: South of Market District