You are here

Colorado » The Colorado » San Miguel County » Telluride » Smuggler-Union Hydroelectric Power Plant

Smuggler-Union Hydroelectric Power Plant

-A A +A
1907. 1.8-mile hike or four-wheel drive ride from Pandora Mill (NR)

This unlikely apparition is spectacularly sited atop 365-foot Bridal Veil Falls, the longest waterfall in Colorado. Buckeley Wells, the manager of the Smuggler-Union Mining Company, supposedly chose the site and worked with architects to design a handsome plant with a stone foundation and steeply gabled and dormered frame superstructure that give it a domestic appearance. On the waterfall side, a two-story bay rises abruptly out of the base to a polygonal roof. Although power plants are often eyesores, this one is most photogenic.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Thomas J. Noel
×

Data

What's Nearby

Pandora Mill
Fort Peabody
Senate Saloon
Wilkinson Public Library (Jail)
The Cribs

Citation

Thomas J. Noel, "Smuggler-Union Hydroelectric Power Plant", [Ophir, Colorado], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/CO-01-SM25.

Print Source

Buildings of Colorado, Thomas J. Noel. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997, 591-591.

If SAH Archipedia has been useful to you, please consider supporting it.

SAH Archipedia tells the story of the United States through its buildings, landscapes, and cities. This freely available resource empowers the public with authoritative knowledge that deepens their understanding and appreciation of the built environment. But the Society of Architectural Historians, which created SAH Archipedia with University of Virginia Press, needs your support to maintain the high-caliber research, writing, photography, cartography, editing, design, and programming that make SAH Archipedia a trusted online resource available to all who value the history of place, heritage tourism, and learning.

,