Places to Visit: Santa Barbara Mission

Santa Barbara Mission
The Santa Barbara Mission is a California iconic and one of the most popular with visitors. The Mission is a special place, a living legend, a cultural treasure and the top tourist destination in Santa Barbara.
The mission has served as a gathering place, and spiritual home for many since it was established in 1786. The tenth mission in the chain it is the only mission to be continuously operated by the Franciscan order.
Today the mission include a museum, gift shop, church, and mausoleum, with several historical gardens. As well as an on going home for Franciscan friers.
The current church is actually the forth version. Beautiful in design with classic lines, the Church’s main facade is Neo-classic with a pediment and Ionic columns. The Franciscans took their inspiration from the book Architectura written by Vitruvio Polion in 27 B.C.
Much more ornamental that the other mission’s simple style, it’s design make Santa Barbara Mission stand out like a jewel. In the niche of the pediment is a statue of Saint Barbara, fashioned out of stone by Chumash sculpture named Popeonus. On the three points of the pediment are the statues of Faith, Hope and Charity.
The Santa Barbara Mission was sustained like all the California missions by the labor of local Indian groups, in this area they were known as the Chumash-Barbareno tribe. It was the Chumash people that actually built the church and the infrastructure to support it.
The churches walls are 5 feet thick constructed of stone and mortar with Moorish windows. Much of the stone work was contributed by Mexican master stone mason Juan Antonio Ramirez.
The interior of the church is unique. The Franciscans brought their classic European images and Chumash artisans blended them with the colors, style and designs that they took from nature. Fusing them beautifully and decorating the interior to create a cultural treasure.
The floor is polished red cement that used olive oil and wine to create the deep color. The unusual winged lighting ornaments from which the light fixtures hang is the same design found in Vitruvius book on architecture.
Three churches were actually built on this site each larger than the last to accommodate new converts.
The original church was quickly replace with in a few years by two succeeding adobe churches. An earthquake in 1812 badly damaged the third church and construction began in 1815 on a stone church that encased the older adobe walls.
The stone church was dedicated in 1820 and is essentially what we see today. Originally built with one tower with a second tower added in 1830.
The Mission’s museum contains nine exhibit rooms which were originally living quarters. Exhibits provide an overview of mission life with insight into Chumash culture with art and artifacts.
A reconstructed bedroom, kitchen, and chapel room are part of the museum. With three of the original statues from the churches facade damaged by the 1925 earthquake on display.
Most California missions feature a central courtyard or quadrangle, a space to gather and create crafts. In 1873, the mission’s quad was transformed into a garden with walkways radiating from the central fountain.
On the eastern wall of the great stone church is a Roman doorway that leads to the cemetery. Above the exterior side of the door are ancient symbols. Skulls and cross bones carved in stone are mounted over the door, a traditional sign for the cemetery in Spanish times, and an early Catholic symbol for the transition between life and death.
The cemetery was laid out in 1789 after the competition of the church. Within the 200 year old sandstone walls of the cemetery are the graves, tombs and mausoleums of early Spanish families and settlers.
There are a number of well know people buried in the mission’s grave yard including Juana Maria, know historically as the Lone Women of San Nicola Island. The Chumash women made famous in Scott O’Dell’s children’s novel “Island of the blue Dolphins.”
The Mission’s infrastructure can be found in Mission Historic Park just east of the church. Where the stone ruins include the walls of the grist mill, tanning vats, and pottery kiln still stand.
A creek two miles above the mission was dammed and water channel in stone aqueducts to flow down to storage basins near the church. The aqueduct supplied orchards, gardens and fountains with water.
The mission’s beautiful Moorish fountain was built in 1808. The fountain’s overflow spilled into the stone laundry basin, where Chumash women once washed their cloths.
The Santa Barbara Mission known as the Queen of the Missions for its grand size and beauty against the backdrop of mountains. The Missions has endured and continues to serve the community as an active Roman Catholic Church and a place of worship operated by the Franciscans of Santa Barbara Province.

[@dmitryostrovsky5763]

Probably the best video I've seen yet of Old Mission Santa Barbara, where I was baptized and still attend mass as well as hang out on the lawn or veranda during various warm afternoons. My most favorite place.

[@destinationtemptation6741]

You have a wonderful connection to Mission Santa Barbara, a place that continues to be a center for the community past, present and future. Thanks for your comments.

[@ivanquintero1777]

I’m doing research for school

[@halodirty8129]

hell yeah brother