On your right, look for the big pink stucco complex with a square tower and a deep arched entry, reached by a wide set of steps under a red tile roof.
Alright, you’ve found one of Santa Fe’s boldest architectural choices… and yes, it’s pink. Not “sort of rose in the sunset” pink-more like “we meant to do this” pink. This is the Scottish Rite Temple, sometimes called the Scottish Rite Cathedral, started in 1911 and finished in 1912, back when organizations like this were part social club, part civic network, and part “we’ve got a meeting tonight, wear something nice.”
The fun twist is how it got designed. In 1909, the local paper announced architect Isaac H. Rapp got the job. Rapp was a big deal around here-offices in New Mexico and Colorado-so it sounded settled. The paper even ran a fancy drawing of his plan: grand, Neo-classical, all dignity and columns. Then… just a week later, the same paper reported his plans were, basically, “not satisfactory.” Ouch.
So Santa Fe hired the Los Angeles firm Hunt and Burns instead. They leaned into a Moorish Revival look-loosely inspired by a gatehouse at the Alhambra in Spain, with that horseshoe-style arch and fortress-like tower. The idea was a kind of architectural family tree: Spanish traditions in New Mexico, traced back to Moorish Spain. And if the tower feels familiar, that’s because it echoes other Hunt and Burns work from the same era.
The building’s had a second life too-Hollywood rolled cameras here for Tina Fey’s 2016 film Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. And in 1987, it landed on the National Register of Historic Places… officially confirming that yes, the pink stays.
