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San Xavier Summary
 

Front view of Mission
Laying the Groundwork
San Xavier del Bac is a mission church and a National Historic Landmark located in Wa:k, a village in the San Xavier District of the Tohono O’odham Nation, approximately 9 miles south of Tucson, Arizona. 
While the church is relatively well understood from an architectural and art historical perspective, A conservation management plan (CMP) incorporates values held by a broad group of stakeholders, including those who actually use the building on a day-to-day basis, and takes this input into account in the determination of significance and management policies.
Developing a CMP for San Xavier del Bac lays the groundwork to ensure that the values and significance associated with the church are understood and that future management, conservation work, or alterations to the site maintain or enhance those values and significance, and importantly, don’t diminish or damage them.



Mission Interior


The church draws tens of thousands of visitors a year, in large part due to it's remarkable interior.

Conservation Management Plans
Conservation management plans (CMPs) are “significance driven,” meaning the recommendations and policies that they suggest are determined by unique sets of values expressed by people who use and care about the site. These values can and do often overlap or even conflict—especially in buildings that are still serving an original, practical function but have acquired high architectural or art historical significance.
CMPs also provide a framework for understanding the building and prioritizing conservation and restoration work. For example, while the Mission church at San Xavier is obviously of premiere historical and artistic value and should be approached using strict conservation standards, other parts of the compound have been substantially modified over time and serve a more utilitarian purpose. They may retain some important historic features, but may provide more leeway when it comes to adapting to suit current needs. CMPs identify important contributing elements in order to ensure they don’t get overlooked and that any future decisions are made with the necessary background information at hand.
This is achieved by laying out a thorough conservation history of the place, including a detailed timeline of past work undertaken. The process, overall, is intended to be a consolidation of existing information, brought together in a pragmatic format to allow managers to make more informed decisions about needed changes and cyclical maintenance. Insight gleaned from past reports, histories, and other research combined with interviews, input, and observations, the CMP coordinator should be able to get a sense of the current uses and demands on a site and understand vulnerabilities that need to be addressed. 





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The Mission is an iconic regional focal point, nationally and internationally renowned as one of the most impressive and well-preserved examples of Spanish Colonial architecture in the United States. It remains an active Catholic parish, primarily serving the local Tohono O’odham community.

This is achieved by laying out a thorough conservation history of the place, including a detailed timeline of past work undertaken. Ultimately, the CMP will reflect a holistic approach to conservation management, recognizing the mission’s role as a working parish; spiritual site; place of local, national and global cultural significance; and popular tourist destination located within the Tohono O’odham Nation in Southern Arizona. It should serve as a user’s manual, explaining what’s there, why it’s important, and then outline how to protect that significance in the future by suggesting appropriate policies and maintenance requirements based on sound conservation practices.

 

Conservation in Progress
Conservators routinely stabilize, dust, and clean the interior walls and finishes throughout the church.
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