The Spanish missions were built by the Spanish missionaries who had no architectural skills or skilled labors. They designed and built all the 21 missions along the costal sides of California. As no imported building material or skilled laborers were available to them, the missionaries built all the churches with the help of unskilled native workers and by using simple make shift machines and methods. They gathered all the building material from the surrounding lands.
Adobes
Also known as mud bricks were made by combining soil and water along with straw and manure. The process of brick making included the selection of area close to water supply near the construction site where the ground was dug out and filled with water. The brick makers mixed the wet soil and water with their feet until a good mixture was formed. They are added, mixed together, and compressed the mud mixture into rows of wooden planks. They were leveled by hands and kept in the sun for drying. All sides of the mixture are exposed equally to the sun so that they dried in uniformity; this prevented them from cracking too. The dried bricks were kept in stacks for use. The soil used for making bricks was either clay or sandy gravel filled earth.
Timber
The logs used for construction purposes were felled with the help of stone axes and handmade saws. The logs used had only their bark stripped from them and this gave the structures a distinct look. The logs were used to give a structure and stability to the walls, to make doors and windows, and for holding the roofs up. The area where the missions were built did not have much variety of trees and the types of wood used were limited. Woods from pine, poplar, and cypress trees were used mostly and due to the unavailability of good amount of logs the mission buildings were built in narrow long shapes.
Stones
Stones formed an integral part of the construction process as they are needed in almost every constructional aspect. Both the missionaries and the natives were no skilled architects or laborers and hence used the sandstone in the buildings as they were easier to be broken or cut. The disadvantage of using sandstone was that they were not weather resistant. The stones were mixed with the help of hand turned or water turned motors. They also added color stones and pebbles in the mud mixture in order to give the structures a beautiful texture.
Tiles
They were used much later in the construction of California missions. They replaced the thatch roofing which was used in the previous mission buildings. They were semicircular in shape and were made of mud. The mud mixture used was mixed with the help of the animals. After the mixture was formed, the whole mixture was spread out and leveled on a flat board and molded over a semi-circular section of wooden logs and dried in the sun. They were then burned in the oven until they attained a reddish brown color.

Contact :
Contact Person: Maureen Sullivan
E-mail: [email protected]
Old Mission San Luis Rey de Francia
Address: 4050 Mission Avenue, Oceanside, CA 92057-6402
Tel/Fax: (760) 757-3651
Website: http://www.sanluisrey.org/