Willie Mae's Scotch House- New Orleans

We are back! We visited Willie Mae's Scotch House on Friday.

1. Do not trust Google Maps when visiting... Get actual old fashioned directions or look at a map. So many of the streets are torn up that google is not great.

2. Do not be turned off by the tourists. We saw more Japanese tourists than locals.

3. Order the white beans (butter beans)! Oh my god! the fried chicken is awesome... but the white beans!

HB and I were very excited about Willie Mae's. First of all, we saw a documentary produced by SFA about the rebuilding of the restaurant. It was a fascinating view of the reconstruction of just one little restaurant. It was kind of a microcosm of the whole city. HB's boss, John Currence, spearheaded the rehab.







Across the street is this amazing school, Phillis Wheatley Elementary School, that obviously has been abandoned and slated for demolition. I heard a segment on NPR about it a couple of months ago. It is such a shame to let this go- it has great lines and design.

This is from the NPR article-
It was designed with principles of sustainability and modernism in mind. It's elevated a full floor above the ground so that the flooding that can occur from time to time in New Orleans, including Hurricane Katrina, was not able to reach the classroom level. It also provided an outdoor shade and places for little kids to play because the supports are only in the middle of the building. And the extensions of the building are cantilevered about 35 feet from support, which is a very, very muscular kind of structure, the kind of thing that you usually see in bridge design rather than in building design.

We should be actively trying to save modernist buildings. Just because something doesn't have columns doesn't mean it isn't important or historical. I think the building is very beautiful!