Models of buildings have been used by architects for many years. They are just one way in which architects visualize what a building is going to look like when completed. A model allows the architect, as well as others, including clients or customers, to understand the three dimensional quality of a structure. More

We look at the Mission Inn wondering where it came from. The name implies a connection to the California missions. So much in fact, that many assume the hotel was once part of the chain of 21 missions dotting the California coastline. At the beginning of the 20th Century, the allure and romance of the California missions spurred the adoption of the Mission style architecture. More

Architect Arthur Burnett Benton, a native of Illinois, attended the Topeka (Kansas) School of Art and Design, worked for the Union Pacific Railroad and moved to California in 1891. First employed as a draftsman with the Los Angeles architectural firm of Sidney I. Hass, Benton would go on to have a very successful architectural career, a career in which he helped develop and promote the architecture inspired by the Spanish, Mexican and the California Native Americans. More

Architectural drawings (also referred to as renderings or sketches) are one of several types of documents created by the architects in the process of designing and completing a building or other type of built project. There are different types of drawings, including preliminary sketches (“schematics”) and “presentation,” “working,” and “as built” drawings. Each has a specific purpose. More

In the Mission Inn we see the Islamic, Moorish, Italian, and Asian influences combined with the Spanish and Mission Revival styles. The architects, Arthur B. Benton, Myron Hunt, and G. Stanley Wilson, created and blended over a thirty year period these architectural styles into a homogeneous structure that resembles no one region of the World.. More

The recognition of the Mission Inn as a National Historic Landmark, a California State Historic Landmark, and a City of Riverside Cultural Landmark reinforced the need to preserve this unique blend of architectural styles. More

Three principal architects were involved in the design of the Mission Inn were Arthur Benton, Myron Hunt, and G. Stanley Wilson.  Hunt, a native of Massachusetts, attended Northwestern University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as well as spending a year in Europe studying its architecture. More

In 1931, the final phase of the Mission Inn was completed.  Located at the north-west corner of the hotel, this phase included the St. Francis Chapel and Atrio, the Galeria and the Court of the Orient.  All were included as part of the International Rotunda or “Rotunda Internacional.”. More

In 1874, seventeen-year-old Frank Miller left Tomah, Wisconsin with his mother, one brother and two sisters, to join Frank’s father, Christopher Columbus Miller, who was already in Riverside.  Two years later, the family had completed a 12-room cottage made of adobe bricks and wood.  Their home was located at corner of 7th Street (now Mission Inn Avenue) and Main Street. More

Building methods and materials have changed since the Mission Inn opened in 1903.   The architects designing the Mission Inn utilized a variety of methods and materials in order to successfully build this structure which does not resemble any one uniform architectural style. More