Make no mistake: South Louisiana home architecture is as unique and diverse as the people who live within those dwellings. Similar to the way that Louisiana’s bayous and streams merge into the larger Atchafalaya River to create one of nature’s great basins, South Louisiana’s architectural vernacular was formed by the blending of various styles and traditions, giving home design a distinct look and feel—one that screams Louisiana.
Spread mostly throughout the southern Acadian parishes—but also existing in other regions of the state—Louisiana’s contemporary home architecture has borrowed styles from its rich past and woven in design elements suited for the sub-tropical climate. In this way, a unique vernacular architectural style has been created, easily recognizable yet distinct from other areas of the country. I call this architectural delight “Nouveau-Acadian” or “Acabellum” (a cross between Acadian and antebellum), if you prefer. Though it may very well take an architectural Indiana Jones with sharper skills to uncover all the interesting pieces of the puzzle and put them together in a way that is easy to understand, here’s my take on the topic.
The Setting
Ever since Iberville and Bienville Le Moyne arrived on the Gulf Coast in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, claiming the area for France, building design in the region has been based on the customs and traditions of the existing ruling country. These early architectural designs were soon adapted to fit the needs of a subtropical climate, one that was prone to torrential flooding and devastating hurricanes. As the years passed and Louisiana welcomed an influx of many different ethnic groups—Spanish, Italian, German, Irish, and Anglo American—home design continued to transform, incorporating design elements and building techniques unique to each group. But it was the French Acadians who, after being expelled from Nova Scotia (Acadie) by the British, had a lasting impact on the architectural style of South Louisiana.
When the Acadians, eventually to be known as Cajuns, first arrived in Louisiana in the mid 1700s, they built simple wooden structures based mainly on their own architectural traditions but also incorporating pre-existing Creole styles already in vogue in South Louisiana, the French-held West Indies, and other places in the Caribbean. These structures were built using cypress wood and a mixture of moss and mud, called bousillage, which was used for binding and insulation. Bousillage was a binding material of cut straw or grass brought directly from western France by the Creoles. It was very common wherever French people settled; but in Louisiana, the material became Spanish moss.
These houses featured, for example, gabled two-slope roofs with a large porch in front and, sometimes, in back of the house, supported by posts made of wood or brick. They were also built off the ground for protection against floods and to help with ventilation against the stifling Louisiana heat. Chimneys on either (or both) ends of the house were also a common feature.
In the nineteenth century, this amalgam of styles and design elements evolved into what is commonly considered the prototypical Acadian style home. Common attributes of these houses were gabled or hipped roofs, chimneys, a large gallery area, and upstairs living quarters for adolescent males called garçonnières, which were usually accessed by an outdoor staircase. Many of these features endure in modern versions of French Creole or Acadian style houses.
However, the architectural elements incorporated in the Nouveau-Acadian style house type do not end there. Though the aforementioned Acadian house type provides the structural component of the story, there are other embellishments derived from Louisiana’s hodgepodge of cultures that inform contemporary Acadian house styles. Into this mélange of features comes an architectural style revitalized by wealthy Europeans and copied by cotton and sugarcane planters of the South.
The Revival
During the antebellum period (1820-1860), before the Civil War decimated the wealth of the Confederate States, wealthy plantation owners built some of the most beautiful and expensive homes of the time. Just as all Louisiana homes cannot be pigeonholed into one style for easy categorization, plantation homes exhibited equal variety, utilizing a broad combination of styles. However, the mansions which incorporated elements of the Greek Revival (i.e. Nottoway in Iberville Parish) and French Colonial (i.e. Destrehan in St. Charles Parish) styles were of a size and splendor not seen before in the South. These homes were noted for their inclusion of massive Doric or Tuscan columns in the front of, and sometimes completely surrounding, the entire house, with intricate frieze work and elaborate home furnishings. The utilization of stucco—a European feature popularized by the Spanish in the New World—also featured regularly in the aristocratic Louisiana South, and has since worked its way into the building techniques of present day Acadian style houses. It is easy to see how these plantation homes—many of which can still be visited in all their restored grandeur—captured the imagination of home builders and designers in South Louisiana and beyond.
Modern Times
In Louisiana today, if one wanted to build a dream house in the Acadian style, there are many architects who could oblige. However, this style house is truly in the eye of the beholder, or the saw of the builder, as the case may be.
Developers have sets of plans for Acadian style house types that vary slightly from one another. They typically have steep roofs, with large front porches supported by some form of column structure, dormer windows with shutters, and a frame made of brick or wood. If the homeowner is looking for an Acadian cottage style, the house can be raised slightly off the ground, as was the custom in the old days. Also, functioning, versus decorative, hurricane shutters would make the home even more traditional.
But the house type that seems to exemplify Louisiana’s past the best and serves as the final piece of the puzzle is what I refer to as Nouveau-Acadian or Acabellum. These houses can be found all over Louisiana in some form; however, they have taken deep root in the lower parts of Louisiana in the Acadiana region in those parishes that were the first home to the exiled Cajuns: Terrebonne and Lafourche in the southeast; St. Mary and St. Martin in south-central Louisiana; and Lafayette, Iberia, Vermillion and the surrounding parishes on the western end of Acadiana.
These houses combine many common architectural elements with the core design being the French-Acadian style house that has survived for centuries, but embellished with a touch of the antebellum South. As a whole, Nouveau-Acadian houses will be made of brick (though no longer insulated with bousillage) and will include a fireplace or two for aesthetic—if not wholly functional—purposes, a stucco-sided front gallery, and large Doric columns. A steep, usually hipped, roof with one or two dormer windows accentuating a wide gallery with chairs for lounging is a common feature. Most of these houses sit directly on the ground, though some are raised off the ground for a distinctive look.
These homes illustrate Louisiana’s architectural vernacular in all its glory. Any drive down long country roads in Acadiana or the state’s plantation region will offer many reminders of Louisiana’s architectural past. From the simple Creole cottage used by farms in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, to the grandiose mansions of the antebellum aristocracy, the Nouveau-Acadian style homes that are their descendants reflect the traditions of Louisiana’s blended heritages every bit as much as the food, festivals, parades, and music. Take a good look at your house. What do you see?
