Buildings and architecture of New Orleans
The buildings and architecture of New Orleans reflect its history and multicultural heritage, from Creole cottages to historic mansions on St. Charles Avenue, from the balconies of the French Quarter to an Egyptian Revival U.S. Customs building and a rare example of a Moorish revival church.
The majority of these cottages are found in the French Quarter, the surrounding areas of Faubourg Marigny, the Bywater, and Esplanade Ridge.
[3][2] Creole townhouses are perhaps the most iconic pieces of architecture in the city of New Orleans, comprising a large portion of the French Quarter and the neighboring Faubourg Marigny.
The prior wooden buildings were replaced with structures with courtyards, thick walls, arcades, and cast-iron balconies.
[citation needed] Typically, shotgun houses are one-story, narrow rectangular homes raised on brick piers.
Most have a narrow porch covered by a roof apron that is supported by columns and brackets, which are often ornamented with lacy Victorian motifs.
The exterior is often wood siding, with a brick, stucco, or stone porch with flared columns and roof overhang.
They were generally raised homes with wooden galleries, the only extant example being Madame John's Legacy at 632 Dumaine Street, built during the Spanish period in 1788.
Two-thirds of the French Quarter structures date from the first half of the 19th century, the most prolific decade being the 1820s, when the city was growing at an amazing rate.
From its south end to the intersection with Claiborne Avenue, Canal Street is extremely dense with buildings.
The soft local soils are susceptible to subsidence, and there was doubt about the feasibility of constructing large high-rises in such an environment.
The 1960s brought the trail-blazing World Trade Center and Plaza Tower, which demonstrated that high-rise could stand firm on the soft ground.
The oil boom of the early 1980s redefined the New Orleans skyline again with the development of the Poydras Street corridor.
Located within the CBD is one of the world's most famous pieces of postmodern architecture, Charles Willard Moore's Piazza d'Italia.
Because of New Orleans' high water table, graves are not dug "six feet under": stone tombs were the norm.
New Orleans has suffered from the same problems with sinking property values and urban decline as other major cities.
Campanella, Richard, Geographies of New Orleans : Urban Fabrics before the Storm, Gretna, LA, Pelican Publishing, 2006.
