A Colorful Travel Guide to New Orleans in 24 Hours
If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you may remember that Jared and I took our first actual trip together to New Orleans way back when. On account of the fact that we were basically babies (clearly kidding), we thought it would be fun to revisit memory lane with a colorful travel guide to New Orleans in 24 hours now that we’re getting married soon.
We still love a lot of the same places from several years ago, but we’ve added plenty of fun new spots to our list, stayed in the Garden district this time (the Henry Howard Hotel is the CUTEST!), and played dress up with J. McLaughlin to welcome the fall weather.
I also ate my bodyweight in carbs, and we walked through the colorful streets until we needed bandaids, so I’d say it was a successful trip. Staying away from the French Quarter was definitely more our jam since we’re pretty laid back when it comes to going out and exploring, and it also gave us a chance to try out the historic street cars that connect the areas of town.
Our hotel only had 18 rooms, plus a cute living room bar, street car tickets at the concierge, and a super warm vibe. We actually spent quite a lot of time hanging around the house talking with the staff and sipping local cocktails. They also have complimentary coffee and muffins in the morning, and a mimosa bar on the weekends so we weren’t in any hurry to rush off each day.
I also shamelessly wore my retro suede dress, button up, and velvet loafers to snap a photo when we saw this retro truck parked across from the hotel, which was screaming for a photo!
Being on the neighborhood side this time around, we tried to stick to new places to eat and see that were within walking distance. We walked to a quick dinner at Cochon the first night. Plan to have about a 30 minute wait on a weekend, and definitely try the smothered greens.
The second night we had a dress-up dinner date at Commander’s Palace, which was also in walking distance through the cutest/fancy neighborhood. I basically took photos of everything along the way, but what’s new?
I also couldn’t pass up the chance to include a photo of this hysterically awesome GIANT SHELL grill sitting in the yard of one of the fancy houses. If this doesn’t sum up New Orleans in a nutshell, I don’t know what does!
There are so many new, cute places that have popped up since the last time we were visiting, that we wanted to see all of them. It took us a quick second to figure out the street car system and timing, but we ended up riding it all the way to Bourbon Street/French Quarter area to walk around from there.
If you’re on the hunt for fun photo-ops, we found quite a few!
Madison Street for the cute pink door photo
Color block wall across from St. James Hotel
Henry Howard Hotel lobby
Garden District neighborhood off of Prytania St.
Frenchman Street
We went back to a few favorite eateries for nostalgia purposes, like Tableau that we stumbled upon the first time around, and I feel like we still have so many to try out. Naturally I wore a swing dress and flats by the end of the trip, haha! I still really want to make reservations at Brennan’s, but we’ll have to save that for next time.
These are a few of our favorites to date from this trip and our last-
Sucre
Cafe Beignet (we liked this WAY better than Cafe du Monde!)
Cochon
Commander’s Palace
Napoleon House
Tableau
K. Paul’s
Stanley
Lilette
St. Roch Market (lots of vendor, food, and drink options here!)
Drip Coffee (our friend Juley just opened this cute coffee and ice cream shop!)
Seaworthy (for cocktails and oysters)
Also important to note, it only got one degree below 70, and I busted out a cape. Why? Because I feel like a super hero, I miss fall in West Virginia, and I had to have this reversible one that’s gray AND tan. Feel free to judge me for that.
We always tend to budget our money for eating ALL of the things, but if you’re looking for shops to browse, I loved these-
Nadine Blake
Freda
DNO
Friend
Exodus Goods
French Quarter Market (for the experience!)
We’re already hoping for another trip back soon! The cooler weather is so perfect for walking the neighborhoods. So much better than sweating myself skinny in May the last time.
Have you all ever been? What are some of your recommendations?! Let us hear it!
And a big thank you to J. McLaughlin for partnering with us on this post!
Sources: suede dress / white button down / knit sweater / grey velvet shoes / nude bag / blue swing dress / red clutch / blue clutch / black skinny pant / striped shirt / black wedges / cape
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