Old Ursuline Convent

About this property

Ursuline Convent (French: Couvent des Ursulines) was a series of historic Ursuline convents in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. In 1727, at the request of Governor Étienne Perier, nuns from the Ursuline Convent of Rouen (Normandy) went to New Orleans to found a convent, run a hospital, and take care of educating young girls. The first building for the Ursuline nuns in New Orleans was designed by Ignace François Broutin in 1727 when the nuns arrived in New Orleans, at the request of Governor Étienne Perier. Michael Zeringue (Johann Michael Zehringer), the King's Master Carpenter from Franconia, Bavaria and progenitor of all "Zeringue" families in Louisiana was the builder. Planning, collecting material, and construction took years. Existing drawings show the building in 1733, although it was not officially finished until the following year. Colombage (half-timbered) or briquette-entre-poteaux (brick-between-post) was the major form of French Colonial construction in the colony during the 18th century (see also Pitot House). Usually the exterior walls were then given a protective covering of stucco or wooden boards; but the fact that the timbered walls of the Ursuline Convent were left exposed is confirmed by a drawing from 1737. Such construction proved to be inappropriate for the humid climate of New Orleans (with significant deterioration already apparent by 1745), in addition to being a fire hazard. In 1745, plans for a new building of brick and protected colombage were prepared by Broutin. The contractor was Claude Joseph Villars Dubreuil, Contractor of Public Works for the King. His wife, Marie Payen de Noyan, was Bienville's niece. This new convent was completed by 1753. It is likely that Alexandre de Batz also took part in the design because several payments are listed to him for work on the new building. The second convent was laid out adjacent to the site of its predecessor, whose materials were partly recycled. In its original configuration, the building's front façade was that facing the Mississippi River; the Chartres Street entrance was located at the back of the building. Built of stucco-covered brick, the present-day Old Ursuline Convent is typical for the French neoclassical architecture. It is a formal, symmetrical building, severely designed in its lack of ornamentation. No applied orders of pilasters or columns relieved the plain walls. Only the slightly arched window set in shallow moldings, the rusticated quoins at the corners and narrow central pedimented pavilion break the even rhythm of the fenestration. The broad plain hipped roof, broken only by small low-set dormers contrasts well with the multi-windowed façade and completes the austere but not unpleasant, finely proportioned building.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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