Architect Gil Sanchez of Scotts Valley, an expert in adobe restoration and care, has spent two days extensively examining Vacaville’s historic Peña Adobe.

Sanchez was hired by the City of Vacaville Public Works Department to examine the structural condition to the 178-year-old adobe and make a report on what’s needed to repair and maintain the three-room structure.

“We are studying the building to examine the causes, see the effects and come up with solutions,” said Sanchez.

Sanchez and his wife, Daryl Allen, said they expect to present a report and recommendations to the City of Vacaville by some time during September.

This inspection is the latest step after the Peña Adobe Historical Society called attention to the need for repairs last year when it started to raise money to assess how best to repair the south wall of the adobe before it deteriorated further.

City officials since pushed forward to bring in Sanchez who is a regional leading expert on adobes and their preservation.

Sanchez’s firm has restored, rehabilitated and documented the history of more than 45 adobe buildings in the Southwest during the last three decades.

The adobe was built in 1842 by pioneer Juan Felipe Peña, one of the county’s first settlers, in what is now Peña Adobe Park in Lagoon Valley.

By the 1950s, it was abandoned and had deteriorated. In 1955, it was designated as a California Historical Landmark. Two county supervisors and the Solano County Historical Society undertook a restoration effort that was completed in 1965.

At that time, the entire bottom of the south wall was replaced with bricks made by California Medical Facility inmates.

The bottom interior of that interior wall and part of another interior wall are now starting to crumble and break away.

The adobe was last worked on in July 2004 when it was retrofitted for earthquake safety, got a new cedar roof and one wall was repaired under the direction of Sanchez.

Sanchez called the Peña Adobe a very important structure since “it tells the history of another time.”

“They don’t build adobes anymore and this is often all we have left of the Spanish/Mexican time (in California),” Sanchez said.

Peña Adobe Historical Society President Cricket Kanouff agreed saying “this is very important because the Peña Adobe is part of Vacaville’s heritage. It is the oldest fully restored building in the area.”

The City of Vacaville has owned the building and Peña Adobe Park since 1966.