Adobe is a building material with a regional grammar. It took root wherever Spanish and Pueblo building practice met an arid climate and a shortage of milled lumber, and it did not travel cleanly to the rest of the country. The chapters that follow open each state where the material is genuinely catalogued — eight where the tradition was substantial, and two where the record is a single documented outlier.
Each regional chapter carries its own history, its own roll of cities, and its own curated ten must-see properties. The card below opens the chapter; the chapter opens the state's full record.
10 states · 222 catalogued entries
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№ 01 · CA Atlas region III — Pacific coastCalifornia
Monterey Colonial and the rancho adobes of the Spanish and Mexican eras — the country's largest adobe catalogue.
- Entries
- 111
- NRHP
- 54
- NHL
- 2
- Cities
- 66
- Earliest
- 1769
-
№ 02 · NM Atlas region II — Río Grande corridorNew Mexico
The deepest adobe landscape in the United States — Santa Fe, Taos, the Pueblos, and the high villages of the Sangre de Cristos.
- Entries
- 60
- NRHP
- 43
- NHL
- 10
- Cities
- 30
- Earliest
- 1150
-
№ 03 · AZ Atlas region II — Sonoran & plateauArizona
Sonoran row houses and presidio adobe in Tucson and the southern desert, with Pueblo Revival on the Colorado Plateau.
- Entries
- 21
- NRHP
- 17
- NHL
- 2
- Cities
- 17
- Earliest
- 1692
-
№ 04 · CO Atlas region II — Front range & San Luis valleyColorado
San Luis Valley plazas and the trading posts of the upper Arkansas — the northern edge of the adobe country.
- Entries
- 16
- NRHP
- 11
- NHL
- 1
- Cities
- 11
- Earliest
- 1940
-
№ 05 · NV Atlas region II — Great BasinNevada
Mining-era adobe roadhouses on the eastern slope of the Sierra and the Tonopah district.
- Entries
- 5
- NRHP
- 2
- NHL
- 0
- Cities
- 4
- Earliest
- 1903
-
№ 06 · TX Atlas region IV — Hill country & Rio GrandeTexas
Spanish Colonial adobe along the San Antonio River and the western reaches above the Rio Grande.
- Entries
- 4
- NRHP
- 3
- NHL
- 2
- Cities
- 3
- № 07 · KSAtlas region III — south-central plains
Kansas
Mennonite-settler adobe on the south-central plains, built briefly after the 1874 Russian migration.
- Entries
- 2
- NRHP
- 2
- NHL
- 0
- Cities
- 2
-
№ 08 · DC Atlas region IV — federal district (outlier)District of Columbia
A single documented experimental adobe structure — included as a federal-survey outlier.
- Entries
- 1
- NRHP
- 0
- NHL
- 0
- Cities
- 1
- № 09 · FLAtlas region IV — Atlantic coast (outlier)
Florida
A 1920s Pueblo Revival commercial block on the Atlantic coast — the southeast outlier in the catalogue.
- Entries
- 1
- NRHP
- 1
- NHL
- 0
- Cities
- 1
-
№ 10 · UT Atlas region II — Wasatch frontUtah
A small Mormon-pioneer adobe vernacular preserved in the Wasatch valley towns.
- Entries
- 1
- NRHP
- 0
- NHL
- 0
- Cities
- 1
- Earliest
- 1866
How the regional record is kept
Every entry in the Atlas carries a state code in its catalogue ID and is filed into the regional chapter above. The chapter inherits the entry; the entry never floats free. New properties are added through the National Register of Historic Places, the Historic American Buildings Survey, and state preservation-office filings — and routed into their state on receipt.