Resort hotel · Yosemite Valley, California · Built 1926–1927
The Ahwahnee
Listed on the National Register as Ahwahnee Hotel
Gilbert Stanley Underwood's granite and concrete hotel of 1927 below the Royal Arches in Yosemite Valley, its 'timbers' cast in stained concrete for fire safety and its interiors painted with Native American and Art Deco designs.
History
By the 1920s Yosemite's concessions were split between two rival companies, and its hotels were rough enough that well-off visitors stayed away. In 1925 Stephen Mather of the Park Service pushed the two to merge, adding $200,000 of his own money, into the Yosemite Park and Curry Company under Donald Tresidder, later president of Stanford. The new contract required a fireproof hotel that could stay open all year. Underwood, fresh from the Union Pacific lodges at Zion and Bryce, was hired. His first scheme rose six stories throughout; the company asked for about a hundred rooms with the feel of a country house, and the plan was reworked. The site, a sunny meadow that had been a Miwok village and later the Kenneyville stables, looked toward Half Dome, Glacier Point and Yosemite Falls.
Built in eleven months from granite, steel and concrete at a cost of about $1,225,000, the hotel opened in July 1927 under the name Tresidder chose just before the opening, from a Miwok word for the valley. To fill winter rooms, the company promoted skiing and staged the Bracebridge Dinner, a Christmas pageant in which Ansel Adams took part. The Navy ran the hotel as a convalescent hospital from 1943. Pool and elevators came in 1963. The hotel was listed on the National Register in 1977 and made a National Historic Landmark in 1987. During a trademark dispute between the outgoing concessioner and the government it was called the Majestic Yosemite Hotel from 2016 until 2019.
“What looks like wood siding and structural timbers between the piers is actually concrete, poured into formwork that shapes it to look like horizontal redwood siding and large milled timbers.”
Architecture
The Y-shaped building of 150,000 square feet steps from a six-story center to three-story wings under hipped and gabled roofs of green slate. Piers of uncoursed granite rubble match the cliffs above; between them, what looks like redwood siding and heavy timber is concrete poured into shaped forms and stained, chosen to resist fire. Inside, Ackerman and Pope blended Native American motifs with Art Deco, Middle Eastern and Arts and Crafts touches: rubber-tile floor mosaics in the lobby, painted beams in the 24-foot Great Lounge with stained-glass panels by Jeannette Dyer Spencer atop its tall windows, Persian rugs, and a Writing Room mural by Robert Boardman Howard. The 34-foot-high dining room has sugar-pine trusses on concrete 'logs'.
What to look for
- Concrete cast and stained to look like redwood siding
- Granite piers matching the valley walls
- Stained-glass panels atop the Great Lounge windows
- Painted Native American patterns on beams and cornices
- The dining room's sugar-pine trusses
Setting
The hotel stands at the east end of Yosemite Valley in a meadow beneath the Royal Arches, with Half Dome to the east, Glacier Point across the valley and Yosemite Falls in view to the west. A stone gatehouse marks the drive, and the meadow south of the hotel, included in the listing, opens toward the Merced River and the valley floor trails.
Timeline
- 1925Yosemite Park and Curry Company formed
- 1927The Ahwahnee opens in July
- 1931–1932Dining room trusses reinforced
- 1943Navy convalescent hospital
- 1977Listed on the National Register
- 1987Designated a National Historic Landmark
- 2016–2019Temporarily renamed the Majestic Yosemite Hotel
Where sources differ
- The nomination counts about 95 guest rooms in the main building; Wikipedia gives 97 plus 24 cottages.
- The nomination glosses 'Ahwahnee' as 'deep, grassy meadow'; translations of the Miwok name vary.
- The listing year is inferred from the National Register reference number; the 1986 form documents the Landmark designation.
