Many environmental factors influence the composition of animal assemblages. For spider assemblages, plant architecture is an important variable. Here we examine the effects of various plant architectural attributes by using models of shrubs in which we control branch orientation (horizontal or vertical) and height above the ground (0, 10, or 40 cm). Guild membership, based on hunting strategy (jumpers, pursuers, ambushers, or trappers), was used to characterize spider assemblages. Five replicates of the six treatments (two orientations by three heights) were randomly placed in a 60 m by 50 m grid among big sagebrush in a shrub-steppe habitat and sampled at 3 week intervals from July–October in 1997 and 1998. ANOVA was used to demonstrate that not only do single architectural variables influence the distribution of spiders but also the interaction of architectural variables influence spider distribution. Differences in the assemblages of spiders on the models were the result of architecture differences. Jumpers selected horizontal, 10 cm models and pursuers selected vertical, 0 cm models. Trappers were most abundant on horizontal, 0 cm models.