Museum Exhibitions
The Museum’s mission is to create meaningful connections to Santa Barbara history. The signature installation, The Story of Santa Barbara traces our community’s story from the Chumash to the mid-20th century.
Accessible and diverse programming along with rotating exhibitions feature dynamic local traditions and historical events. Visitors also experience the Edward Borein Gallery, the Gledhill Research Library, and two historic adobes.
1925!
Santa Barbara Remembers The Earthquake
Boom! At dawn on June 29, 1925, our city shook with a 6.3 earthquake leaving much of downtown destroyed or heavily damaged. The twin towers of Mission Santa Barbara collapsed, and many commercial buildings in our downtown were destroyed or badly damaged. A failed dam in the foothills released forty-five million gallons of water, and a gas company engineer became a hero when he shut off the city’s gas supply and prevented fires like those that destroyed San Francisco twenty years earlier. Out of the rubble would come a new Santa Barbara with the headline, “Spanish Architecture to Rise from Ruins.”
The museum is one of many cultural organizations commemorating the earthquake. For more information visit EQ2025.
Open through July 6, 2025
DON LOUIS PERCEVAL
His Vision of the West
Don Louis Perceval (1908-1979) was born in Woodford, Essex, England and raised in Los Angeles, where he attended the Pasadena Military Academy and Chouinard Art Institute.
As a young man he became fascinated with the Hopi and Navajo people and began documenting their life through his sketches. After studying at the Royal Academy and service to the Royal Navy, he was drawn back to the west and commissioned to create advertisements for the Rio Grande Oil Company. After a life dedicated to his work he spent his final years in Santa Barbara.
This exhibition is being created by Marlene R. Miller.
Open through August 17, 2025
The Story of Santa Barbara
The Museum’s mission is to create meaningful connections to Santa Barbara history. The signature installation traces our community’s story from the Chumash to the mid-20th century. The exhibition features highlights of our extensive collection including clothing, furniture, fine art, photographs, decorative arts, and more.
An audio guide is available to accompany your self-guided visit.
Permanent Installation
Edward Borein Gallery
Western artist Edward Borein (1872-1945) roamed the western states and territories and much of Mexico, working as a cowboy and using his artistic talent to record these experiences.
In his early thirties Borein decided to pursue a career as a professional artist and moved to New York City, where his studio soon became a favorite haunt for important figures such as Will Rogers, Charles M. Russell, Carl Oscar Borg and Buffalo Bill Cody. In the early 1920s he returned to his native California and set up a permanent studio in Santa Barbara. His etchings, watercolors, and drawings quickly earned him a reputation as one of the foremost interpreters of the American West.
The Museum holds the largest and most significant collections of his work, thanks to the dedication and research of curator Marlene Miller.
Permanent Installation
Partner Exhibition at the Museum of Natural History
Fashion Fatale: The Human Obsession with Feathers explores humanity's fascination with feathers as symbols of beauty, power, and status. Created by the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, and showcasing several pieces from the Historical Museum, this exhibition invites visitors to view how feathers have graced fashion—from ceremonial adornments to mass-market trends—and to consider the impacts of these choices on bird populations.
On view now at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History
