The Ahwahnee Hotel at Yosemite National Park will be closed early in 2023 for seismic safety work to be performed/NPS file

Substantial structural upgrades needed at the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite National Park will require the iconic hotel to close for about eight weeks early next year.

Nearly $32 million in funding from the Great American Outdoors Act will be spent on seismic upgrades and kitchen renovations, the park announced Tuesday. The kitchen project work is currently underway and work to upgrading the seismic safety will begin near the end of the year. 

"The Ahwahnee is a crown jewel of national park lodges” said Yosemite Superintendent Cicely  Muldoon. “This much-needed work will ensure the Ahwahnee is seismically safe for present and future generations of Yosemite visitors.”  

The seismic upgrade component of the project includes bracing the chimneys and support walls, replacing window frames and dining room glass and Solarium, as well as other infrastructure upgrades in high use visitor areas. Lastly, the project will include an updated HVAC system and safety improvements to the fireplaces located in the Great Lounge.  

More than a decade ago a report noted numerous public safety issues at the Ahwahnee revolving around seismic stability and fire protection for guests and employees. While park officials early in 2012 came up with a plan for renovating the historic structure, at the time they had no timetable or stated funding source for addressing the violations. Now the funding is coming through to address the issues.

The Ahwahnee opened in 1927 at the urging of Stephen Mather, the first director of the National Park Service. Mather envisioned a grand, rustic lodge to encourage visits to the park and promotion of the national park idea. The Ahwahnee was designed with large public spaces, such as the Great Lounge, to welcome all park visitors whether or not they were staying at the hotel. There are 97 guest rooms and 24 cottages at the Ahwahnee. Famous visitors to the hotel have included President John F Kennedy, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, and President Barack Obama and his family.  

But the Ahwahnee is not exactly as it appears. Gilbert Stanley Underwood, the renowned architect who, along with his colleagues of the day, gave us "Parkitecture," designed the hotel at the request of Director Mather. In drawing up his plans, the architect used slight-of-hand, figuratively speaking.

Underwood, who never graduated from high school yet wound up with an undergraduate degree from Yale University and a master’s degree from Harvard, wasn’t tightly wedded to “Parkitecture.” He could ably design charming park lodges imbued with rustic touches of logs and rock and arts-and-crafts flourishes while also creating coldly efficient federal buildings. His federal courthouse in Seattle came to define “federal Art Deco,” while the poured-in-place concrete that went into the Anchorage federal courthouse was dubbed “New Deal Concrete.”

And, from time to time, the architect found good use for concrete in the national parks. When he designed the massive and breathtaking Ahwahnee, Underwood used weathered granite for the exterior walls and concrete in place of timbers and planks. By pouring concrete into wood-lined forms and then staining it so it would appear to be redwood in both texture and color he created “shadowood,” a technique that he returned to a quarter-century later when he designed Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park.

In order to safely accomplish a complete kitchen renovation, the Ahwahnee will be closed for about eight weeks in early 2023. Yosemite Hospitality Inc. (YH), the park’s primary concessionaire, will not be accepting reservations during the closure period and there will be no visitor access to the Ahwahnee. YH is currently communicating with incoming hotel guests about the projects and visit impacts. For information on the projects, dates of closure, and impacts to hotel operations, please visit www.travelyosemite.com.