1401 Delachaise St
New Orleans, LA 70115, USA

Sommerville-Kearney House - National Register of Historic Places

Statement of Significance:

The significance of 1401 Delachaise Street is architectural. It is a rare example of a raised cottage in the Queen Anne style and, as such, represents the amalgamation of the national style with local building traditions. Although vernacular in that the style was adjusted to local building practices, the cottage transcends the "builder's" type by its coherent and competent design.

New Orleans is rich with extant representatives of the nineteenth century architectural styles. There is, however, a notable lack of good examples of the stick, Eastlake. Queen Anne, and, to a lesser extent, shingle styles. Many late nineteenth century and early twentieth century dwellings in New Orleans’s suburban neighborhoods reflect the popularity of the Queen Anne style after the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition of 1876. Built a decade or so after the style had run its course on the architectural front, these local examples, usually or simple shotgun and two-level form, acknowledge the style only through a casual application of characteristic details.

The unknown architect of 1401 Delachaise evinces a more.c6mprehensive understanding of the-^intent and spirit of the Queen Anne style, than do the builders of other local "Queen Anne" houses. His design expresses the renewed interest in picturesqueness and the submerging freedom froing set architectural rules. His massing and contrasting of shapes and textures reveal a knowledgeable familiarity with national trends. It is interesting to note the similarity between this cottage and figure 67, "Farm House in the English Rural Style" in A.J. Downing's The Architecture of Country Houses. Downing's designs, of such national impact, had never broken through the persistence of local building types.

Judge Walter Syers Sommerville lived In the cottage fron its construction in 1890-91 until 1906 . He then married and moved further uptown. His two spinster sisters remained in the house until 1921. Dr. Harold Kearney then owned the property from 1935 to 1976.

The lot upon which the cottage was built was originally a portion of the estate of Jerome Toledano in the Faubourg Plaisance. From 1860 to 1887, Pierre Benjamin Buisson, a French born land surveyor, owned the suburban property, then a larger lot extending to Louisiana Avenue. Buisson’s home. Was in the. center of-the lot, facing Louisiana Avenue. The house was in front of the rear lot acquired by Sommerville in 1890.

In s1,1mmary, 1401 Delachaise is of local significance in that it is a rare and well-executed example of a Louisiana Raised cottage in the Queen Anne style. l The cottage is of national significance in that it is representative of the development of the Queen Anne style during its period of dissemination and national organization. Created several years after the heyday of the style on the eastern seaboard, the design of 1401 Delachaise is tempered by local traditions, and differs from earlier eastern examples.

1The Cresson House, 2800 block Esplanade Avenue, is a raised cottage in the "Queen Anne" style. Built in 1902, its style is really more typical of late Victorian gingerbread than of the Queen Anne. Its form has moved away from that of nineteenth century raised cottages toward that of the early twentieth century.