page_title: Architecture of the California missions
section_title: Building materials
hierarchical_section_title: Architecture of the California missions / Building materials
caption_attribution_description: English: The campanario (bell wall) at Mission San Juan Bautista. Photograph by Robert A. Estremo, copyright 1986.
context_page_description: The architecture of the California missions was influenced by several factors, those being the limitations in the construction materials that were on hand, an overall lack of skilled labor, and a desire on the part of the founding priests to emulate notable structures in their Spanish homeland. And while no two mission complexes are identical, they all employed the same basic building style.
context_section_description: The scarcity of imported materials, together with a lack of skilled laborers, compelled the Fathers to employ simple building materials and methods in the construction of mission structures. Since importing the quantity of materials necessary for a large mission complex was impossible, the padres had to gather the materials they needed from the land around them. Five basic materials we used sexucting the permanent mission structures: adobe, timber, stone, brick, and tile. Adobes (mud bricks) were made from a combination of earth and water, with chaff, straw, or manure added to bind the mixture together. Occasionally pieces of bricks or shells were placed in the mix to improve the cohesiveness. The soil used may have been clay, loam, or sandy or gravelly earth. The making of the bricks was a simple process, derived from methods originally developed in Spain and Mexico. A convenient, level spot was chosen near the intended building site and close to a suitable water supply (usually a spring or creek). The ground was dug up and soaked with water, whereupon bare-legged workers would stomp the wet earth and binders into a homogeneous consistency fit for carrying to, and placing in, the brick molds.
  The mixture was compressed into the wooden formas, which were arranged in rows, and leveled by hand to the top of the frame. From time to time, a worker would leave an imprint of his hand or foot on the surface of a wet brick, or perhaps a literate workman would inscribe his name and the date on the face. When the forms were filled, the bricks were left in the sun to dry. Great care was taken to expose the bricks on all sides, in order to ensure uniform drying and prevent cracking. Once dry, the bricks were stacked in rows to await their use. California adobes measured 11 by 22 inches (280 by 560 mm), were 2 to 5 inches (51 to 127 mm)  thick, and weighed 20 to 40 pounds (10 to 20 kg), making them convenient to carry and easy to handle during the construction process.
  Facilities for milling lumber were almost non-existent:  workers used stone axes and crude saws to shape the wood, and often used logs which only had their bark stripped from them. These methods gave mission structures their distinctive appearance. Timber was used to reinforce walls, as vigas (beams) to support roofs, and as forms for door and window openings and arches. Since most of the settlements were located in valleys or coastal plains almost totally devoid of suitably large trees, the padres were in most cases limited to pine, alder, poplar, cypress and juniper trees for use in their construction efforts. Indians used wooden carrettas, drawn by oxen, to haul timber from as much as forty miles away (as was the case at Mission San Miguel Arcángel). At Mission San Luis Rey, however, the ingenious Father Lasuén instructed his neophyte workers to float logs downriver from Palomar Mountain to the mission site. The lack of good-sized timber forced the men to design mission buildings that were long and narrow. For example, the widest inside dimensions of any of the mission buildings (at San Carlos, Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz) is 29 feet (8.8 m): the narrowest, at Mission Soledad, spans 16.2 feet (4.9 m). The longest structure, at Mission Santa Barbara, stretches 162.5 feet (49.5 m). Stone (piedra) was used as a construction material whenever possible.  In the absence of skilled stonemasons, the inexperienced builders resorted to the use of sandstone; though easier to cut, it was not as weather-resistant as that which would have been used by skilled artisans. To bind the stones together, the priests and Indians followed the (Mexican) Pre-Columbian technique of using mud mortar, since mortar made from lime was unavailable to them. Colored stones and pebbles were added to the mud mixture, giving it "a beautiful and interesting texture."
  Ladrillos (conventional bricks) were manufactured in much the same manner as adobes, with one important difference: after forming and initial drying, the bricks were fired in outdoor kilns to ensure a much greater endurance than could be a
caption: The three-bell campanario ("bell wall") at Mission San Juan Bautista. Two of the bells were salvaged from the original chime, which was destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
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