The Columns

The Columns

The mahogany staircase inside The Columns has carried guests to its second and third floor rooms since 1883, when the mansion was a private residence on St Charles Avenue. It became a boarding house during World War I, and in 1953 a local family turned it into a hotel, with the porch bar becoming a fixture the whole city claims as its own. Eighteen rooms sit across three floors of a building listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The family that bought it in 2019 restored the property and added a new garden and patio without stripping out what made it distinctive; rooms mix antique and modern furnishings with original architectural details, and the Premier Avenue Suite has fifteen-foot ceilings and an upstairs guest-only porch overlooking the avenue. What separates this hotel from newer boutique openings nearby is the bar: a James Beard-nominated team runs the cocktail program in the restored mahogany room, the coffee counter opens at 7am daily, and there is live jazz on the porch some evenings, including a recurring residency. A library, restaurant, concierge and laundry service cover the rest, along with an elevator to the upper floors, though the ramp into public areas may not fully substitute for a lift given the building's age. The hotel sits about 4 km from the city center, near Curahealth New Orleans and Touro Infirmary Hospital. This suits someone after New Orleans history and a genuine drink over hotel-chain polish, comfortable with a short ride into downtown. It won't suit anyone wanting a large modern property or total quiet, since the porch and bar draw as many locals as guests. Eighteen rooms, a mahogany staircase from 1883, and a bar with James Beard-nominated bartenders: that combination isn't sitting elsewhere on the avenue.