This remodelled hotel on New Orleans’ ‘Auto Row’ is walking distance from everywhere

With New Orleans’ French-inflected neighbourhoods bursting with tourism, visitors are discovering less thronged areas to unwind. That’s been good for the city’s Warehouse District, a hotbed of repurposed industrial-age buildings. Its new Hotel Perle was purpose-built more than a century ago as the Alberta Hotel, servicing the businesses of Auto Row, a strip of Model T showrooms on historic St Charles Avenue.

The contemporary incarnation bridges the gap between the French Quarter to the north and the Garden District to the south. And it’s arguably never looked this good. Expressly designed for group travellers (exceedingly common in NOLA) by boutique studio Ward + Gray, it opens into bright, spacious common rooms with double-height ceilings and large, reupholstered antique sofas.

Walls are painted in dusty vintage hues and rich, pleated fabrics are everywhere. Ward + Gray collaborated with New Orleans architecture firm Rome Office on the dramatic architectural details.

Every guest room is a suite with a full kitchen, dining space, lounge and multiple bedrooms. The seven-bedroom suite has four full bathrooms and windows facing around the property — all share a media room and an extra-long marble island in the French-style kitchen. The highlight, though, is an upper-floor heated pool and deck open until 10pm. From here you can spot the historic St Charles streetcar trundling past, as it has for 90 years. You can climb on to reach the neighbouring districts for the full New Orleans experience, but it’s easier simply to walk.