Garden District and Lafayette Cemetery No. 1

The Garden District is an Uptown neighborhood of New Orleans, Louisiana, developed in the 1830s to 1850s by wealthy American merchants who settled upriver from the French Quarter. Its streets are lined with Greek Revival and Italianate mansions set behind wrought-iron fences, oak trees and lush gardens, and the area is known for the sheer density of grand historic homes. Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, at 1427 Sixth Street, was established in 1833 and is a classic New Orleans city of the dead, with whitewashed above-ground tombs, family vaults and society tombs, a design suited to the high water table. Visitors usually walk the quiet streets around Washington Avenue, Prytania Street, Coliseum Square and Jackson Avenue, admiring the exterior of homes including Colonel Short's Villa with its cornstalk fence and other notable mansions, most of which are private residences and cannot be entered. Lafayette Cemetery has been opened to visitors on scheduled days, and some access has been limited to guided tours, so checking the current rules with Save Our Cemeteries is wise. The usual route takes two to three hours, starting at the Washington Avenue streetcar stop on the St. Charles line, wandering past the mansions, and ending at the cemetery gate. Lunch spots and shops on Magazine Street are a short walk away. Photographers favor the oak-shaded sidewalks, the sunlit tomb rows and the details of ironwork and columns. The neighborhood is calmest in the morning, while crowds of tour groups tend to arrive late morning and early afternoon, especially on weekends and in cooler seasons. Summer heat and mosquitoes can be uncomfortable, so visitors often bring water and wear light clothing. Cemetery rules ask for respect: visitors should not touch or climb on tombs, and should stay on the paths. Guided tours, typically around $25 to $35, add stories on architecture, local families and the cemetery's role in popular culture.