Mission Loreto
Misión de Nuestra Señora de Loreto Conchó
Loreto has the most historic of the missions The mission, inscribed with the cool title of “Cabeza y Madre de todas las Misiones de la Alta y Baja California,” was the original headquarters for the Jesuit settlement of the Californias, and the starting point of the Camino Real, aka the California Mission Trail. Pretty much all of the early expeditions to the Californias passed through there.
Map from: California from the Conquistadores to the Legends of Laguna
The mission was founded in 1697 and the stone building was built in 1740, but it has been modified, damaged, repaired, and renovated various times.
18th Century Drawing of the Mission, public domain
Mission Loreto in 1957
Mission Loreto 2010
There’s an eclectic mix of stone on the mission. The front facade is quarried limestone, but I counted five different kinds of stone on the entire building, plus some bricks added during some repair jobs. The mix of bricks and stone is something I’ve seen on the mainland of Mexico, and, for large buildings, the effect is much nicer than I would have expected.
Basalt, Limestone, and Brick
More photos of the mission are below.
Courtyard of the Museum
Wild Fig Root Cross
The Arched Gate
The Church Courtyard
Stone, Bricks, and Stucco
One of the Doors
The Main Facade
This entry was posted on Sunday, February 7th, 2010 at 11:43 am and is filed under historic, stone. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
February 8th, 2010 at 8:09 pm
I prefer how it looked in the 18th century or even 1957–I’m not sure the asphalt parking lot does much for its period flavor! The wall with the basalt and limestone and brick is pretty wild. Maybe it was plastered over at some point?
February 9th, 2010 at 9:19 am
Yeah, Toyotas don’t really add period flavor. The Mexican tourism board has done a lot to develop the town and the town has grown up around the mission more than a lot of visitors would like. I actually liked the town of Loreto more than I expected, though.
It looks like part of the wall was stuccoed, but I’ve seen stone and brick combinations used in new construction that was left exposed, so I don’t know what the intent was.