The Lamy Building, also known as St. Michael's Dormitory, is a historic building in Santa Fe, New Mexico. It was built in 1878 as the main building of St. Michael's College, the predecessor of

St. Michael's High School St. Michael's High School is a private Catholic junior/senior high school located in Santa Fe, New Mexico. It is privately run under the auspices of the international Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, better known as the De ...

and the

College of Santa Fe Santa Fe University of Art and Design (SFUAD) was a private, for-profit art school in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The university was built from the non-profit College of Santa Fe (CSF), a Catholic facility founded as St. Michael's College in 1859, an ...

. The building is a

contributing property In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distri ...

in the

Barrio De Analco Historic District The Barrio de Analco Historic District is a National Historic Landmark District centered at the junction of East De Vargas Street and Old Santa Fe Trail in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The seven buildings of the district represent one of the oldest clu ...

and currently serves as the headquarters of the New Mexico Tourism Department.

History

St. Michael's College was established at the behest of Archbishop Jean-Baptiste Lamy, who had arrived in New Mexico in 1851 to find that formal schooling in the territory was nonexistent. After establishing the Loretto Academy for girls in 1852, Lamy recruited the De La Salle Christian Brothers to open a similar school for boys, and St. Michael's held its first classes in the fall of 1859. In the 1870s, the school appointed a new leader, Brother Botulph, who oversaw its growth into an institution of higher learning. Under Botulph, St. Michael's began offering high school diplomas, and later, teaching certificates. In 1874 it received a charter from the territorial legislature, making it the oldest chartered college in New Mexico.Colleges and Universities
City of Santa Fe Economic Development The college eventually phased out its post-secondary courses but continued to operate as

, while a new St. Michael's College was established at a separate campus in 1947. In 1877, Brother Botulph started a fundraising campaign to construct a new building for the school which netted sheep, goats, and cattle in addition to cash and building materials. Ground was broken on the building in April 1878 and it was ready for classes by November. The first two stories were constructed from

adobe Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for ''mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of e ...

, while the third floor was wood-framed to save weight. In 1926, the wooden upper story was destroyed by a fire, reducing the building to its present two-story height. After this, it remained in use as a dormitory but was vacated when St. Michael's moved to a new campus in 1966. The building was sold to the state of New Mexico and renamed in honor of Archbishop Lamy; it now houses the New Mexico Tourism Department. It was remodeled in the

Territorial Revival Territorial Revival architecture describes the style of architecture developed in the U.S. state of New Mexico in the 1930s. It derived from Territorial Style, an original style which had developed in the 19th century and before, in the wider re ...

style in the 1950s, adding brick coping and a bellcote to the parapet. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and New Mexico State Register of Cultural Properties in 1968 as a

in the

. with

Architecture

In its present form, the building is a nearly symmetrical two-story adobe structure, in length by in width with a two-story Territorial Style ''portal'' or veranda wrapping around the north and east sides. The original wooden third floor had a

mansard roof A mansard or mansard roof (also called a French roof or curb roof) is a four-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterised by two slopes on each of its sides, with the lower slope, punctured by dormer windows, at a steeper angle than the upper. The ...

with evenly spaced dormer windows, a

gambrel-roofed A gambrel or gambrel roof is a usually symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. (The usual architectural term in eighteenth-century England and North America was "Dutch roof".) The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, w ...

cross-gable A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aesth ...

above the main entrance, and a tall tower. After the fire in 1926, the building was truncated at the second floor with a flat roof. The present brick coping and bellcote were added during a 1950s remodeling.

References

External links

{{Santa Fe, New Mexico National Register of Historic Places in Santa Fe, New Mexico School buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in New Mexico Government buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in New Mexico Education in Santa Fe, New Mexico School buildings completed in 1878 Government buildings completed in 1878 1878 establishments in New Mexico Territory