At first glance, Emilie Taylor and Seth Welty’s New Orleans residence appears to clash with the city’s storied aesthetic.

After outgrowing their Seventh Ward home, the Weltys found an overlooked property near the Mississippi River levee in the city’s Black Pearl neighborhood. “When we saw the house on the lot, it was pretty clear that it was beyond fixing,” says Seth. But the plot was unusually large and also near the river and Tulane University, where Emilie serves as the director of the architecture program.

They tore down the existing house and designed a new 2,800-square-foot home composed of two horizontal boxes stacked on the front of the lot. The larger one, capped by an angled roof, is clad in workaday, metal siding. It sits on top of the smaller box, covered in salvaged terra-cotta roof tiles the couple found on Facebook Marketplace and DIYed into place. In other words, it couldn’t look more different from its traditional shotgun house neighbors.

“We have a lot of love and respect for the historic fabric of this city,” says Emilie. “But if you were to just replicate what was already there, it’s not as honest or rich as if you built something of your own time and moment.”

That said, the home is an amalgamation of salvaged materials and inexpensive, adaptable finishes, an echo of the city’s collective spirit of forming solutions from whatever’s readily available.

The treads, made from repurposed counter-tops, are set into a steel framework whose material cost roughly $300. The kitchen and living room open to terraces through floor-to-ceiling glass sliders. Emilie attributes the home’s ample natural ventilation to those as well as to its tall, thin profile, a choice made to keep the overall building footprint small." layout="" credit="Add credit" photoUserId=""/>

“When I went to a lumberyard or Home Depot, I spent a lot of time looking at a thing, whatever, a block of concrete—what can we do with that?”
—Seth Welty, architect and resident

The stair breaks up the open living spaces while allowing light and air to pass through it. The staircase cost $2,204 for 168 square feet of material in total." layout="" credit="Add credit" photoUserId=""/>

The couple find the house a bit large for them. Although they achieved the goal of more yard space for the children, Emilie feels the family of four could live leaner than they do here. However, she wouldn’t mind having a hobby room. When asked if they would have done anything differently, Seth just says, “I don’t know.... I think it’s not done.” For Emilie, one thing missing is a costume room in place of the tiny closet that currently holds festive getups: “That’s something that every New Orleans home should have.”" layout="" credit="Add credit" photoUserId=""/>The balconies are places for crafting. Their floors are covered in durable Pavestone Pewter Concrete Step Stones, which cost roughly $3.19 per 16-inch paver. The corrugated metal panels that give the exterior its industrial appearance totaled nearly $11,000, with an estimated $3,000 for additional trim pieces." layout="" credit="Add credit" photoUserId=""/>

“The kids wanted their dream tree house, which had seven stories, and we were like, no, it’s not going to happen. But we at least got them a second story.”
—Emilie Taylor Welty, architect and resident

A spiral staircase salvaged from a project by Emilie and Seth’s design firm, Colectivo, which often works on historic buildings, leads to the garden. Everything above the first level resembles a commercial building but with well-defined, sharp details that clearly delineate it all as a residence—an intentional nod to industrial design with “some human elements so it wouldn’t feel like living in a shipping container,” Seth adds. The Weltys spruced up the yard with compost soil from Schmelly’s Dirt Farm (six yards for $450 total), as well as 50 cubic yards of free wood chips from ChipDrop. Native flora provides a natural privacy shield to the lower-level rental apartment, abetted by 25 to 30 trees planted along the street, a zero-cost collaboration with urban reforesting organization SOUL Nola! Other free materials included demolished countertops used as antirot material in the compost area; leftover columns used as edging for the garden, along with industrial drainage pipes retrieved from the roadside; and old signs and table legs that morphed into plywood and lumber racks in the workshop." layout="" credit="Add credit" photoUserId=""/>

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: Colectivo

Structural Engineering: Marais Consultants

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Turning Simple Materials and Recycled Finds Into a New-Old New Orleans Home