Coffee Wash French Quarter Plans

We welcomed Tulane Master of Preservation Studies Professor Laura Blokker's first year students to SEAA last week. We wanted them to see what Tulane architecture students were doing in the late 1920s and early 1930s, so brought out large-scale coffee wash plans of the French Quarter, which were entered in the S.S. Labouisse competition. Each sheet focused on one entire block of the New Orleans French Quarter, and showed the footprint of all buildings, details such as courtyard paving, landscaping, stair and fireplace placement, and elevations of buildings surrounding the block. To give the drawings an aged look, the students used diluted coffee in lieu of watercolor on the heavy paper, and some sheets were shellacked. We also included a few more Tulane architecture student drawings--a watercolor drawing of ironwork details by Tulane alum and former architecture professor, Bernard Lemann, and an ink wash drawing of French Quarter doors by another Tulane alum and co-founder of the New Orleans architectural firm, Koch and Wilson, Samuel Wilson, Jr.