La Rivera and Marian Hall, Downtown, Santa Fe, NM – SOLD

About the property

La Rivera and Marian Hall is the 4.88-acre compound on East Palace Avenue that for more than a century served as St. Vincent Hospital, Santa Fe’s first hospital. The site holds approximately 165,000 useable square feet across multiple connected buildings, one block east of The Plaza and one block north of the gateway to Canyon Road. The compound includes Marian Hall (1910) on its west end and the larger La Rivera hospital block (1950 core) at its center. At the time of the Webster Estates sale, the property had been operating in part as offices for Presbyterian Medical Services and occasional location work for film and television production, with substantial vacant capacity throughout.

The sale closed in 2008 at $20,000,000, the largest transaction in the Webster Estates Select Solds archive by a wide margin.

Architecture and history

The architectural lineage on the property runs through two of the most consequential architects in Santa Fe’s history.

Marian Hall (1910) was designed by Isaac Hamilton Rapp, the architect more broadly known as a co-designer of the New Mexico Museum of Art on the Plaza, the building that effectively codified what came to be called Santa Fe style. Marian Hall predates the Museum of Art by several years and shows Rapp working in the same vocabulary he would later apply to the civic building down the street: massed adobe-form volumes, stepped parapets, recessed window openings, and a register that read as continuous with the older Spanish-Pueblo buildings rather than as an interruption to them.

The 1950 St. Vincent Hospital core was designed by John Gaw Meem, the architect most associated with the maturation of Spanish-Pueblo Revival in the mid-twentieth century. Meem’s contribution to the compound expanded the hospital substantially through the postwar years; his work on East Palace sits in conversation with the residential Meem buildings further east on the same street, including the 1925 residence at 518 East Palace (also a Webster Estates Select Sold). The result is a single block of East Palace Avenue with Meem buildings on both ends: residence at the east end, hospital at the west.

St. Vincent Hospital itself was founded in 1865 by the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati, brought to Santa Fe by Archbishop Jean-Baptiste Lamy. It operated on the East Palace site until 1977, when the hospital relocated to St. Michael’s Drive (it operates today as CHRISTUS St. Vincent Regional Medical Center). The buildings continued in varied institutional and commercial use through the decades that followed.

The neighborhood

East Palace Avenue runs east from The Plaza past the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis, through the heart of the Historic East Side, and out toward Canyon Road. The compound’s east property line is effectively the start of Canyon Road’s gallery district; its west property line is a block from the Plaza itself. There is no more central commercial-historic parcel in Santa Fe at this scale. The Historic East Side context includes the Cassidy Estate and the 518 East Palace Meem residence, both Webster Estates transactions.

For the broader neighborhood frame, see our Historic East Side neighborhood guide and the guide to John Gaw Meem homes in Santa Fe.

About the transaction

The Webster Estates team handled the sale of La Rivera and Marian Hall in 2008 at $20,000,000. The Webster buyer subsequently sold the property to Drury Hotels in 2007–2008 (the redevelopment timeline began at that point). Drury Hotels opened the Drury Plaza Hotel Santa Fe on the site in summer 2014, after a multi-year adaptive reuse program that retained approximately 97 percent of the existing structural elements across the Rapp Marian Hall and the Meem hospital core. The hotel today operates 182 rooms inside the historic envelopes. The structural reuse figure is the part of the story worth holding onto: the Rapp and Meem buildings are essentially intact, repurposed without being erased.

The transaction was the largest in the Webster Estates Select Solds archive at the time of close, and it remains so. We represented the property through marketing, showings, and close, working from our office at 54½ Lincoln Avenue on The Plaza.

Frequently asked questions

Q: What was St. Vincent Hospital in Santa Fe? A: St. Vincent Hospital was Santa Fe’s first hospital, founded in 1865 by the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati, brought to Santa Fe by Archbishop Jean-Baptiste Lamy. It operated on East Palace Avenue until 1977, when the hospital relocated to St. Michael’s Drive.

Q: Who designed Marian Hall and the St. Vincent Hospital buildings? A: Marian Hall (1910) was designed by Isaac Hamilton Rapp, co-architect of the New Mexico Museum of Art. The 1950 St. Vincent Hospital core was designed by John Gaw Meem, the architect most associated with mature Spanish-Pueblo Revival in Santa Fe.

Q: What is the Drury Plaza Hotel Santa Fe? A: The Drury Plaza Hotel Santa Fe is the 182-room adaptive reuse of the former St. Vincent Hospital, opened in summer 2014. Approximately 97 percent of the existing structural elements were retained, preserving the Rapp Marian Hall and the Meem hospital core inside the hotel envelope.

Q: How large was the La Rivera and Marian Hall property? A: The compound covered 4.88 acres with approximately 165,000 useable square feet across multiple connected buildings, one block east of The Plaza.

Q: What did La Rivera and Marian Hall sell for? A: The property sold in 2008 for $20,000,000, the largest transaction in the Webster Estates Select Solds archive. The Webster Estates team handled the sale.

Q: Who owns the former St. Vincent’s site now? A: Drury Hotels owns the site and operates it as the Drury Plaza Hotel Santa Fe.

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The Webster Estates Team handled this transaction. Chris Webster, Patti Webster, Christopher Webster III, and Paisley Mason Webster, Associate Brokers at Sotheby’s International Realty, operating from 54½ Lincoln Avenue on The Plaza since 1976.