The Hotel

When I left off last time, I had us just entering Taos. At this point, I did have some touch of altitude sickness (Taos is 6,969 feet/2,124 meters high), but via a combination of slow, controlled, deep breathing (be careful with that!) and not moving fast, I managed to overcome it.

We drove a ways through town. It is an interesting place. Very modern buildings and ancient adobes are mixed together. Other areas have an odd 1950s or even ‘40s feel to them. One particularly fascinating structure is the Taos Inn, which is right downtown.(1) I gather it dates back quite a ways--all the way, in fact, to the 19th century, when it was a collection of adobe homes. One of these became the residence of Thomas "Doc" Martin, a local physician and a major name in Taos’ politics and development.(2)

About the photos: First, here’s the Kiva Fireplace in our hotel room, with a wee fire burning merrily. We loved it. Next, Martha at breakfast the following morning. This was at the hotel. Not a bad breakfast spread, actually. And lastly, another cottonwood. This is on the grounds of the hotel.

In 1899, his home became the meeting place of the Taos Society of Artists, an early artists’ co-operative in the area which did much to advance the interests of local artists.(3) This made the home into one of the centers of intellectual and creative life in New Mexico at the time.

Later still, when Doc Martin passed on, his wife, Helen Martin, turned the house into a thriving hotel, then called “The Martin Hotel.” The property passed to a number of different owners and was eventually renamed “The Taos Hotel.” It is still in business today, still as a marvelous adobe structure, and still boasting an enormous red neon sign out front, harkening back to the ‘40s and ‘50s, and a remarkable piece of period art in its own right.

But we didn’t stay there (though someday we’ll do so). Martha had found another hotel for us–the El Pueblo Lodge.(4)

I don’t know how she found it, but I’m delighted she did. It is way up on the north side of town, sort of in the direction of the Taos Pueblo. And it is quite charming. It is basically a small cluster of buildings, all in Pueblo Revival style, all adobe or made to look like adobe, and circling a sort of center courtyard with grass, picnic tables, and trees.(5)

We checked in and a pleasant clerk told us where to park. We followed her directions -- around the side of the buildings, then to the back, then the room was on the ground floor at the corner. We parked and checked out the room. It was very nice--old-fashioned, without being tawdry. It, too, was Pueblo Revival with a front door and a back door which opened on the courtyard. If it hadn’t been chilly, we could have eaten supper outside.

The most remarkable thing about the room was that it had a fireplace. Right in the corner toward the back. It was an old-fashioned, Pueblo-style fireplace.(6) Or, more precisely, it is known as a “kiva style” fireplace. It is hard to describe what one is, exactly, but I will put some pictures of it here. Basically, though, you usually find them in the American Southwest, usually in adobe homes, and usually they are beehive-shaped, or at least rounded.

They are quite warm, actually -- warmer than traditional fireplaces. That’s because they are made of adobe or thick masonry, and that material retains the heat. It then radiates the warmth into the rest of the room. Very often, other sorts of fireplaces don’t do that. And, worse, they push hot air up the chimney, while sucking air from outside the house into the room in which they’re placed. That’s why when you sit directly in front of a fire, you can feel the radiant heat, but sit too far away, and you’re actually chilled.

Beside the fireplace was a metal container of wood, kindling, and paper. There were also matches nearby. Yes, you could kindle your own fire in the room (and we did, later). That was charming...and also, I thought, amazing in this day and age. I had a vision of a modern, corporate hotel...run from some distant location...and hearing the Legal Department squeal with horror. “You want to let guests play with *fire* in their rooms!? Are you *insane*?”

And afterwards, doubtless, the fireplaces would be bricked up and/or replaced by LED screens on which, for an extra ten dollars a night, you could display a video of an open flame, complete with the realistic sound of popping and crackling.

But, yeah, I don’t want to go there.

Anyway, we got into the room. I brought in our luggage. “Very nice,” we thought.

Now, the next question was dinner.

We didn’t know it, but things were about to get ...complicated.

But more about that next time.

More to come.

Footnotes:

1. See the hotel’s website here:taosinn.com/ as well as the hotel’s entry at Wikipedia, which is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taos_Inn

2. “Thomas (Doc) Martin,” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_%22Doc%22_Martin

3. “Taos Society of Artists,” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taos_Society_of_Artists

4. The El Pueblo Lodge’s website is here: https://elpueblolodge.com/

5. For more on the Pueblo Revival style, see here: “Pueblo Revival architecture,” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pueblo_Revival_architecture

6. There doesn’t seem to be a Wikipedia entry on Kiva Fireplaces, so here are some other websites which offer more information on them:

*“Santa Fe Style Kiva Fireplaces,” Santa Fe Real Estate Property, accessed December 16, 2025, https://santaferealestateproperty.com/blog/santa-fe-style-kiva-fireplaces

*“Santa Fe Architecture: Adobe, Viga & Kiva,” Home Staging Santa Fe, accessed December 16, 2025, https://www.homestagingsantafe.com/post/santa-fe-architecture-adobe-viga-kiva

*“Santa Fe Style Kiva Fireplace,” YouTube video, posted by County Office Property, accessed December 16, 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrQJPGH9uA8

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