Loretto Chapel and the Miraculous Staircase
207 Old Santa Fe Trail, Santa Fe, NM
Santa Fe, NM
A little Gothic chapel in the heart of old Santa Fe, home to a spiral staircase that curves up two full turns with no center pole to hold it, built by a carpenter who, the story goes, appeared out of nowhere and then disappeared without a name.
In a small Gothic chapel just off the plaza in Santa Fe stands one of the most famous staircases in the world, and one of the most puzzling. It rises to the choir loft in a graceful wooden spiral, making two complete 360-degree turns, and it does so without a central pole or any visible means of support, as if it were simply coiled in the air. For nearly 150 years people have come to Loretto Chapel to stand beneath it and wonder how, and by whom, it was ever built.
The staircase comes with a story that has been told and retold until it became legend. The nuns who built the chapel were left with a loft and no way to reach it, so they prayed for help. A stranger appeared, the tale goes, built this impossible stair over a matter of months with the simplest tools, and then left without pay, without thanks, and without ever giving his name. Whatever the truth, the result is real, and it is beautiful.
What Guests Love
- The famous spiral staircase that seems to hang in the air with no center support
- The mystery of who built it and how, still argued over today
- The jewel-box Gothic chapel with its tall stained-glass windows
- Standing in one of the most storied little buildings in the Southwest
Worth Knowing
- The chapel is privately owned and charges a small admission; it is open most days as a museum and event space
- You can walk right up to the staircase but not climb it, so it is best appreciated from the floor below
- It sits in the walkable historic core, a short stroll from the Santa Fe Plaza and the cathedral
- Santa Fe sits at about 7,000 feet, so take the altitude and strong sun seriously
Details
Santa Fe, NM
Learn about Loretto Chapel and the Miraculous Staircase
A chapel modeled on Paris
Loretto Chapel was built between 1873 and 1878 for the Sisters of Loretto, an order of nuns who ran a girls' school in frontier Santa Fe. It was designed in the Gothic Revival style by French architects, its pointed arches, spires, and stained glass modeled after the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, and it rose as a tiny, ornate piece of Europe in the middle of the adobe Southwest.
The little chapel was finished on the outside and richly decorated within, with imported stained-glass windows and a soaring vaulted ceiling. But it was left with one strange problem. The choir loft was set high above the floor, and there was no staircase to reach it, and the small chapel had no room for a normal set of stairs without eating up the seating below.
The prayer and the stranger
According to the story handed down by the Sisters of Loretto, the nuns faced with the empty loft made a novena, nine days of prayer, to Saint Joseph, the carpenter and patron of woodworkers. On the last day of their prayers, the legend says, a man appeared at the chapel with a donkey and a box of simple tools and offered to build them a staircase.
Working quietly, the story continues, he built the spiral stair over several months using only a saw, a square, and hammers, and joined its pieces with wooden pegs rather than nails. When the work was done, he vanished before the sisters could pay him or even learn his name. To the nuns, and to many who have visited since, the timing and the craftsmanship felt like an answer to their prayers, and the stair became known as the Miraculous Staircase.
The staircase itself
Set aside the legend and the staircase is still remarkable. It makes two complete turns as it climbs to the loft, a tall wooden helix with no central column, no newel post at its heart to carry the load. Instead the curving wooden stringers support themselves, the whole spiral acting like a coiled spring, an engineering feat that has left carpenters and mathematicians studying it ever since. It was originally built with no railing at all; the graceful banister was added later.
Experts still debate the details, the exact type of wood, which does not seem to match anything that grew nearby, and how a single craftsman with hand tools achieved such precise curves. That unsolved quality is part of the draw. Visitors come to admire a genuinely beautiful object and to stand inside a real mystery, in a chapel small enough to take in at a glance and strange enough to think about long after.
Closest Boutels
The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.
Things to Do Near Santa Fe
Santa Fe Plaza
About 3 blocks
The 400-year-old heart of the city, a tree-shaded square ringed by adobe portals, markets, museums, and galleries.
Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi
About 2 blocks
Santa Fe's grand French Romanesque cathedral, built by the same era's clergy, a short walk from the chapel.
San Miguel Chapel
About 2 blocks
An adobe mission church often called the oldest church in the United States, dating to the early 1600s.
De Vargas Street House
About 2 blocks
A low adobe dwelling billed as the oldest house in the United States, with parts dated to around 1646, beside San Miguel Chapel.
Canyon Road
About 1 mile
A historic adobe lane packed with art galleries and studios, one of the great gallery walks in the American Southwest.