Decades after burning to the ground, San Francisco’s gigantic long-lost bathhouse has been brought back to life thanks to high-tech wizardry.
World Labs –– an AI startup that was co-founded by computer scientist Fei-Fei Li –– released an AI model called Atlas that takes 2D photos and transforms them into pixel-perfect 3D worlds.
Following its release this week, a video posted on X showed off the new AI model digitally reviving the Sutro Baths in San Francisco –– once the world’s largest indoor swimming establishment.
“Atlas is an omni model that we pretrained from scratch to natively operate on text, images, video, and 3D,” World Labs said in an announcement.
“Atlas uses that context to generate what comes next, staying consistent in 3D with everything it has seen and imagining what lies beyond it,” the startup added on.
Unlike other models, Atlas tries to understand where objects are in surrounding areas and how the scene may continue beyond its original given frame. It also attempts to see an image not just as pixels.
The Sutro Baths were developed in 1894 by Adolph Sutro, who was a self-made millionaire immigrant that served as mayor of San Francisco.
The legendary bathhouse was a massive complex that could pack 10,000 people inside and featured six saltwater pools which were kept at varying temperatures. One freshwater pool was also included.
Built right by the Pacific Ocean, high tides from the sea would naturally fill the 1.7 million gallons of water required for the pools in just one hour according to the National Park Service.
There were even band concerts, talent shows and restaurants, while paintings and artifacts from different parts of the worlds were showcased at the front entrance.
After Sutro’s death in 1898, the business steadily declined. By 1964, developers purchased the property and intended to replace the Baths with high-rise apartments.
However, a devastating fire burned the Baths to the ground just two years later and the site eventually became part of a US National Park Service area.
