GHOSTS OF NEW ORLEANS

Chambers Architects doesn’t usually post articles about ghosts or the supernatural. But, when the spirits of the dead are a major part of the psyche of a culture and add value to marketing campaigns focused on architecture, we take notice.

On a recent trip to the French Quarter as research for a book, the number of tours and signs advertising live-in ghosts, or the absence of phantoms, impressed us. One retail store posted this sign at their entrance, “Good Spirits Allowed.” Not knowing whether we were good or bad for business, we dared to enter. At Marie Leveau’s home, we were asked to use “Only Positive Magic Please.”

One of the Finest Street Museums in the World

The evolution of house forms, from French Colonial Plantations, Creole Cottages, Entresol, Townhouses and Shotguns to Cornerstone Storehouses, can all be seen in and within walking distance of the Quarter. Only three solely French structures remain in the eighty-five block area of the National Historic Landmark district known as the French Quarter. 

The Great 1788 New Orleans Fire destroyed 856 of the 1,100 structures in New Orleans, Louisiana while it was a colony called New Spain. Rebuilding continued in Spanish style, and most French-style architecture disappeared from the city.

Had the French held on to more than the name in the rebuilding of the Quarter architecture, most buildings in the Vieux Carre would have retained French influences. After forty years of Spanish rule, the settlers abandoned the character of their homes, keeping only the French language and customs. They still make the sauces of their ancestors, drip coffee the French way and dance in the streets long after their children have fallen asleep. The Quarter's par terre gardens remain French in style with flowers in the middle of yards and walkways along the boundaries. Grassy lawns are not common and considered lacking in imagination.

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