The Funky Secret Fun of New Orleans Interiors

Perhaps no American city has both its history and its funkiness on such lively display as New Orleans—and that’s just what we can see in public spaces. Behind the cocktail bars, parade routes, and po’boy shops, New Orleanians’ homes are layered with cracking plaster, art, antique porcelain, and stories. 

A gorgeous new book, Bohemian Soul: The Vanishing Interiors of New Orleans, aims to capture and celebrate that spirited balance of elegant and eccentric—and protect what’s left of it in the face of change. “There is an authenticity that is undeniable, as well as unexpected beauty,” writes Valorie Hart, the author and an interior designer, in the introduction. 

Hart explains the wide range of houses and people that she and her collaborator, the photographer and fellow local Sara Essex Bradley, include: “An artist in a humble garret, gifted interior design professionals, a trust-fund baby with deep pockets, an eccentric dreamer, a Voodoo queen, world travelers, collectors, antiquarians, a resourceful magpie, bon vivants, gypsies, and old souls all have the ability, and the urge, to create home environments that are truly their own.” 

In other words, this is not a book of professional designs or sleekly renovated house-flips. These interiors reflect the lives of genuine creative homebodies—colorful trim frames patterned curtains, oft-used copper pans hang above stoves, books teeter in piles, candles sit askew in sconces, paint peels, and folk art might share wall space with a gilded mirror. These glimpses into a hidden world arrive thanks to this treasure trove of a book, the people who put it together, and the subjects who let us peek behind their shutters:

Not far from Audubon Park, a Victorian, Eastlake-style raised cottage features intricate porch railings and curved brackets and scrolls.

Hidden off Esplanade Avenue, the Seraphim House sometimes transforms into a dance party and event space. A monumental chandelier salvaged from a hotel looms in the sitting room, and the marble floor juxtaposes with crumbling walls and the modern chairs.

The G&G contributing editor and lauded food writer Jessica B. Harris says of her New Orleans home: “The frame within a frame is my madness. The wall texture is twenty-five years of New Orleans climate and gleeful neglect.”

Some of Harris’s collection of copper cookware.

This historic apartment’s dining room includes a vintage early twentieth-century butcher shop sign featuring a pig holding a sausage and a nineteenth-century French antique gilded mirror.

A couple’s Bywater home mixes fun and finery, like this disco ball lolling above the navy blue wainscotting in the kitchen.

In his circa-1836 cottage, the antiques dealer Kerry Moody placed a nineteenth-century portrait of a Creole gentleman of color in a spot of honor above the living room fireplace.

The owner of this home is known by architects and designers as Mr. Colour for his expertise in historic paint colors. For his own living and dining room, he chose Palace Green, a Benjamin Moore shade from the Williamsburg collection. He installed the striped floor, a combination of white oak and Brazilian cherry.

In this French Quarter residence made from two combined carriage houses, each room features vignettes like this gilded sconce with candles askew.

A couple downsized into this 1930s bungalow, lining the shelves with their collections of baskets, art, and ceramics.

From the antiques-filled studio of the artist Andrew LaMar Hopkins, a view of the balcony and beyond.

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