diff --git a/odoo/addons/base/ir/ir_ui_view.py b/odoo/addons/base/ir/ir_ui_view.py
index f181b1786b2..40df3341055 100644
--- a/odoo/addons/base/ir/ir_ui_view.py
+++ b/odoo/addons/base/ir/ir_ui_view.py
@@ -127,6 +127,13 @@ def get_view_arch_from_file(filename, xmlid):
         if node.tag in ('template', 'record'):
             if node.tag == 'record':
                 field = node.find('field[@name="arch"]')
+                if field is None:
+                    if node.find('field[@name="view_id"]') is not None:
+                        view_id = node.find('field[@name="view_id"]').attrib.get('ref')
+                        ref_id = '%s%s' % ('.' not in view_id and xmlid.split('.')[0] + '.' or '', view_id)
+                        return get_view_arch_from_file(filename, ref_id)
+                    else:
+                        return None
                 _fix_multiple_roots(field)
                 inner = u''.join([etree.tostring(child, encoding='unicode') for child in field.iterchildren()])
                 return field.text + inner