Pontalba Buildings
Parisian-style row houses with cast-iron balconies, among the oldest continuously rented apartments in the country.
This guide to the Pontalba Buildings in New Orleans opens with four gunshots fired in a Paris bedroom in 1834, when the Baron de Pontalba tried to force his daughter-in-law Micaela Almonester to sign over the largest private fortune in New Orleans. She survived and sailed home in 1848 to rebuild the square she owned, hiring and firing architects James Gallier and Henry Howard along the way. You'll hear how she fought her own contractor over every dollar of the job, even inspecting the site herself in work clothes. Look up at the balcony ironwork as you listen for the mark she left on it.
Audio guides are written and narrated by AI.