New Orleans' Painters Street is a palette of bright hues

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New Orleans' Painters Street is a palette of bright hues
June 20, 2009
Stephanie Bruno
nola.com

THE
NEIGHBORHOOD: Milneburg, a section of Gentilly bounded roughly by Leon C. Simon Drive on the north, Filmore Street on the south, Franklin Avenue on the east and Elysian Fields Avenue on the west. The Gentilly Terrace neighborhood is to the south and Pontchartrain Park to the east. Milneburg derives its name from the town of Milneburg -- a resort founded by Scotsman Alexander Milne in the early 1800s -- which was located to the north of the neighborhood, on the shores of Lake Pontchartrain. Milneburg benefits from its proximity to the University of New Orleans, but it flooded after Hurricane Katrina due to breaches along the London Avenue Canal to the west. The Milneburg Civic Association is leading efforts to clean up and to attract new businesses and residents to the neighborhood of retirees, families and the UNO community.
Stephanie Bruno / The Times-PicayuneAn array of bright and cheery colors can be found in Milneburg on the 6100 block of Painters Street, where post-Katrina renovations are complete at every standing house.

THE BLOCK: The 6100 block of Painters Street on the even-numbered, or west, side. The block is bounded on the north by Robert E. Lee Boulevard and on the south by Madrid Street.

THE HOUSES: A row of seven double shotguns, all renovated since the storm and painted an array of bright and cheery colors. The homes are set back from the sidewalk a bit and feature front lawns with foundation plantings and an occasional palm. Driveways offer off-street parking. Although it isn't easy to pinpoint the architectural style of the houses, my best guess is that they were built from the 1920s to the 1940s.

I see Santiago Compass almost every day while I am writing at my computer and he is wrestling with my front gate and its idiosyncratic locking mechanism. Compass delivers the mail in my neighborhood, but one day he delivered something more: a tip on a block for a Street Walk.

"It's the 6100 block of Painters Street," he tells me, "and it's the only block in Milneburg that is 100 percent back. You should take a look."

So I do.

Anatomy of the block

Just as Compass promised, the block is a sea of color in an area still laboring to get back on its feet. Seven double shotguns occupy the even side of the street, with a vacant lot at the corner of Painters and Robert E. Lee (a house lost to the storm, Compass says).

Each house has a porch across the front, shaded by the roof overhang and supported by either iron or wood columns. Paths from the sidewalk lead to the front steps, which are centered on the porches. I notice flower beds and some landscaping, and think how the greenery sets off the houses. Chairs of one kind or another occupy several porches, and I imagine they get plenty of use in the late afternoons, when it is cooler.

The roof lines on the houses alternate -- first a gable-ended then a hipped roof, next a gable then a hip -- all the way down the block. The variation creates a nice syncopated rhythm underscored by the color scheme.

Starting at the corner of Painters and Madrid, I encounter a house behind a fence. I note this, because it is the only one that has a fence along the sidewalk. I don't know if this was the norm pre-storm, but the remaining houses on the block share their front lawns with passers-by.

Next up is a lemon-drop yellow house with sparkling white trim and slender round columns. The steps and foundation are painted a warm terra cotta so that they both contrast with and complement the body color. Blue Lily of the Nile and red oleander -- trained as standards -- fill the garden and add the final touch.

Adjacent is a white house with dark blue trim and bright red entry doors. Here the columns are wrought iron, in a pretty pattern. I admire the crispness of the composition, which stands out against the yellow house next door.

A hipped roof house comes next. It is swathed in a gorgeous periwinkle blue set off by gleaming white trim. Residents on the right side of the house have added multi-colored whirligigs in the garden, imparting a bit of whimsy.

The house a few steps farther along could be a twin of the lemon-drop house. Its gable faces the street, and it features the same slender columns supporting the roof. But instead of a demure pastel, this house is painted barn red.

The hipped-roof house adjacent has a garden filled with vivid purplish-pink petunias. They must be the Wave variety, the kind that can take the heat; I think about this as I begin to wilt in the midday sun. Fanciful light standards mark the front lawn, and the forest-green color of the house is cooling on a hot summer day.

I end the walk with a tangerine-colored house, again with a street-facing gable. The porch, foundation and steps are painted a dark, glossy gray, anchoring the house to the ground and standing out in contrast to the body color.

Life on the street

As I stand in the street, a car pulls up and a woman frowns at me.

"What are you doing taking pictures of all the houses on the street?" the driver asks with more than a little tinge of suspicion in her voice.

"I'm taking them for a newspaper story," I tell her. "Santiago Compass sent me."

With the mention of his name, the clouds part, and she begins to smile.

"I'm his aunt," she tells me. "He said you might be coming by."

I mention that Compass told me he had grown up on the block, and that his mother still lives there.

"That's my sister," she says, and then she points to one of the colorful cottages. "She's in that house there, and her car is in the driveway. Go ahead and knock."

She drives away and I walk toward the house. But before I reach the front porch, my phone rings, calling me back home. I'll have to save the visit for another day.