What makes a town an artists’ colony? There’s always something indefinable. Maybe only an artist can see what makes for an artists’ haven. Such was the case with Taos, in America’s south-western state of New Mexico, a surprisingly green place thanks to the Rio Grande River and a network of underground aquifers, and it’s this greenery and the perfect light that drew many artists to the town in the early part of the 20th century.

The traditional architecture of hummocky dwellings uses adobe (a mixture of mud, clay and straw) and is painted wonderful shades of dusty pink and faded terracotta, while zoning laws prohibit high-rise buildings and ugly signage. New Mexico only joined the United States in 1912 and has a reputation of being a place apart, which Taos exemplifies. If you want more bustle, try the state capital, Santa Fe, 112 kilometres away.

For a sense of old Taos, you need to visit Taos Pueblo, just out of town. This ancient settlement belongs to the Pueblo Indians and is the only living Native American community designated both a World Heritage Site by Unesco and a National Historic Landmark, having being continually inhabited for 1,000 years.

Its rough and ready primitiveness is one of the factors that drew artists to this amazing place and it’s now a living museum of sorts, with many dwellings (some without electricity or running water) still inhabited by Pueblo Indians. Some are private homes, others have gift shops at the front and living quarters at the back and so are open to the public. Standing rather incongruously in the centre of the settlement is a whitewashed church with bell tower and stained-glass windows.

‘Colonialists’ brought Catholicism but most Puebloans have adopted a mix of Christian and Native American traditions.

The best time to travel is early spring or September to avoid the blistering heat, but under the hot midday sun the cool shop interiors are welcome relief as the thick adobe provides amazingly effective air-conditioning. One shop/home has a large gallery at the back, selling wonderful Navajo pots and the turquoise and silver jewellery for which New Mexico is famous, but look closely and it’s also a family kitchen with lino and a propane cooker.

Listening to locals there’s often resentment that not only was tribal land stolen but someone put a parking lot on it. The Taos Pueblo is the oldest and most complete Native American settlement in the US, and that it survived at all is partly thanks to one woman – Mabel Dodge Luhan. A New York heiress, she came to Taos in 1917 with a dream to found an arts colony. Enchanted by the architecture and the scenery, the desert scrub of sagebrush and the brooding southern spur of the Rockies, she also found herself in the midst of the Pueblo Indians (and married one).

Over the years, Luhan saw her vision fulfilled, but only to a degree. Carl Jung, Aldous Huxley, Leopold Stokowski, Georgia O’Keefe, Martha Graham and Ansel Adams all came to Taos, and the actor and artist Dennis Hopper even ended up buying Luhan’s house in the 1970s. It later became an exquisite 19-room B&B.

After 12 months of long-distance stalking, Luhan coaxed writer DH Lawrence to sample the magic of Taos, thinking he would be just the man to highlight the plight of the Pueblo Indians and help define a new American modernism in art and literature. Lawrence had been searching to create his own sunny, free-love utopia in an atmosphere that would help his incipient TB, and Taos with its otherworldliness, dry desert heat and high altitude might have been just the place.

Arriving in 1922, he stayed for several months, writing, painting and contending with the increasingly pushy Luhan, who saw Lawrence as her protégé. His reaction – ‘I don’t choose to be anybody’s protégé’ – meant they grew increasingly disillusioned with each other and Lawrence called Luhan’s radical chic clique ‘high-brow palefaces’ and even nicknamed Taos ‘Mabeltown’.

Sadly, Taos never did fulfil Luhan’s dream of becoming the cradle of American modernism. But over the years, it certainly attracted an array of artists, jewellers and photographers as the great phalanx of gift shops, galleries and small museums attest.

But there’s still a lot more to the town than its bohemian vibe.

Bluesky: @kenwilson84.bsky.social