Tneme-News
NEW ORLEANS OFFERS A ‘GUMBO’ OF
ARCHITECTURAL STYLES
Five years after the floods unleashed by Hurricane Katrina
focused national attention on New Orleans, the city
has become a prime destination for business and leisure
travelers looking to have a memorable experience. Today,
the number of hotels and restaurants in New Orleans are
higher than pre-storm levels and the annual number of
visitors to the region is approaching pre-storm levels, which
averaged about 8.5 million people.
An abundance of architectural styles reflecting the city’s
cultural heritage can be found along Canal Street, a 170-footwide corridor that stretches from the Mississippi River to
Lake Pontchartrain, dividing New Orleans into uptown and
downtown sections. “For two hundred years, Canal Street
was the center of commercial activity in New Orleans,”
explained John Magill, a historian with The Historic New
Orleans Collection and co-author of “Canal Street: New
Orleans’ Great Wide Way.” “With all manner of events
occurring on the thoroughfare, it became the equivalent of
Times Square in New York or Picadilly Circus in London,”
Magill noted.
Adding to the nostalgia of Canal Street are its green and
candy-apple red streetcars that still navigate along the
street’s wide median, as well as the historic lamp poles
referenced in Fodor’s travel guidebook on New Orleans,
which noted: “Admire the streetlights on the neutral ground
(as locals call it; you might call it the meridian); they were
a gift from France and when they were first lit – none other
than Thomas Edison throwing the switch – they made Canal
Street the most illuminated street in the world.”
Among the attractions that draw so many visitors to New
Orleans each year is the city’s “rich gumbo of cultures –
French, Caribbean, African, American and many others,”
according to the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
“This vibrant heritage is evident in 20 National Register
Historic Districts, where more than 30,000 structures display
an enormous variety of architectural styles and forms –
from simple Creole cottages and shotgun houses to elegant
galleried mansions with ornate wooden and cast-iron
ornamentation.”
Visitors can experience late Victorian and Mid-19th Century
Revival architecture in New Orleans’ Garden District,
along with examples of Greek Revival in the Central City,
Esplanade, Faubourg Marigny and Lower Garden District.
Colonial Revival and Bungalow/Craftsman architectural
styles can be seen in the Broadmoor and Carrollton Historic
Districts, while examples of Italianate mingle with Early
Commercial, Romanesque and Greek Revival in the various
historic business districts.
In his memoir “Life on the Mississippi,” Mark Twain recalled,
“Canal Street was finer, and more attractive and stirring
than formerly, with its drifting crowds of people, its several
processions of hurrying streetcars and – toward evening – its
broad second-story verandas crowded with gentlemen and
ladies clothed according to the latest mode.”
Continued on back.
cast-iron substrate, the entablature was primed with Series
90-97 Tneme-Zinc, an advanced technology zinc-rich
urethane, followed by an intermediate coat of Series 66 HiBuild Epoxoline, a polyamide epoxy. A topcoat of Series
73 Endura-Shield, an acrylic polyurethane, completed the
project. “In 2008, the U.S. Custom House became home to
the Audubon Insectarium, which is North America’s largest
entomology museum,” Lomasney noted. One year before
Hurricane Katrina hit, approximately 20 years after the initial
restoration, the Custom House was recoated again with an
advanced zinc/epoxy/fluoropolymer coating system from
Tnemec.
Many of the low-rise, three- and four-story buildings of
Twain’s era can still be found along the strip, scattered
among the dozens of modern hotels and attractions such as
Harrah’s New Orleans Casino, the Riverwalk shopping and
entertainment complex and the Aquarium of the Americas.
The proximity of modern architecture to historic landmarks
such as the U.S. Custom House creates an interesting contrast
for visitors to Canal Street. Constructed between 1848 and
1881, the Custom House retains its original design, which
includes modified Greek and Egyptian Revival architectural
elements. The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA)
has described the granite building as, “one of the major works
of architecture commissioned by the federal government in
the 19th century.”
Designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1974, the
four-story Custom House was renovated by the GSA in the
early 1990s to recapture the structure’s original grandeur.
The project included the use of an advanced technology
coating system from Tnemec on the building’s cast-iron
entablature. “The cast iron façade was in the upper section
of the building used for the roof support system,” explained
Bill Lomasney, who was the coating consultant for the
project. “The cast-iron band is a fairly unique architectural
feature.”
“The cast-iron entablature contains widely spaced triglyphs
(three vertical bands) in the frieze and dentils (small
square blocks) in the cornice, and supports a triangular
pediment above the central portico on each façade,” the
GSA explained. “Near both ends of each facade is a slightly
projecting bay composed of four modified Egyptian pilasters
supporting the entablature.” Following preparation of the
Harrah’s New Orleans Casino on Canal Street specified a
similar coating system to protect the building’s canopy and
structural steel from abrasion, wet conditions, corrosive
fumes, chemical contact and exterior weathering. “The zinc
primer was spray-applied by the fabricator to the canopy
and most of the structural steel,” Lomasney recalled. “After
the steel and canopy were erected, they were touched up
by the field applicators prior to receiving the intermediate
and finish coats.”
Supporting the downtown area as the city’s “economic
engine” and continued preservation “as a valued resource
for a living city” are two key goals contained in the city’s
new Master Plan, which received final approval by the
City Council in August. David Dixon, who led the team of
consultants who created the plan, acknowledged that under
the plan, “New Orleans’ cultural heritage is its most potent
weapon in attracting investment and talent.” The master
plan also supports the creation of a “green framework of
sustainability” and the use of zoning to help make New
Orleans “America’s greenest city.”
Originally included in the October 2010 E-News.
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