Jazz Quarters

Located just across Rampart Street from the French Quarter, the often-clamorous neighborhood also referred to as Vieux Carré (Old Square). Our Creole Hotel is therefore located only steps from the French Quarter, in Faubourg Tremé, commonly known as Tremé, which, like nearby Faubourg Marigny, is a neighborhood more subdued than the French Quarter. Yet it is one with a history as rich as any neighborhood in New Orleans, for it has always played a central role in the history of the city. While a diverse neighborhood, Tremé is perhaps best known as the oldest neighborhood of “Free People of Color” in the United States and, as such, is the only place where people of color were able to own property before the Civil War. A history of our Creole Hotel would not be complete without history of the surrounding area, so let’s begin with a history of the neighborhood. In 1717, two years before the City of New Orleans was founded, the King of France, King Louis XIV, gave the Compagnie des Indes a 25-year monopoly of control over the economy of the French Colony, properly called La Louisiane, once they transported 6000 French settlers and 3000 black slaves to the colony, which stretched from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico and from the Appalachian to the Rocky Mountains. Compagnie des Indes, in turn, awarded large land grants called Concessions to wealthy landowners to stimulate the economy. Our neighborhood of Tremé was first developed in 1725, when Chevalier Charles de Morand, who was an employee of the Companie des Indies, established the first brickyard in New Orleans, in the nearby area of Bayou Road (the southeastern leg  of which is now called Governor Nicholls Street).