Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008 - (Page 60)

Bloom’s Arcade Tallulah’s 1930s-era retail complex was a forerunner to modern shopping malls When Mertie Bloom’s new shopping arcade began to rise in downtown Tallulah in Madison Parish just one year after the Great Crash of 1929, Bloom clearly was optimistic about the future of his innovative retail venture. Certainly Bloom’s Arcade was well positioned, adjacent to the railroad depot and immediately visible to disembarking passengers. The building’s other side faced Highway 80, the main east/west route across northern Louisiana. To encourage motorists to stop, Bloom incorporated a filling station on the building’s corner. An additional attraction was a movie theater, which occupied the building’s downtown end. Although Bloom’s Arcade has now fallen on hard times, its architecture is an important part of Louisiana’s history. Art Deco motifs decorate the facade (above and opposite page, bottom) and interior columns (opposite page, top) of Bloom’s Arcade. A canopy runs the entire length of the Bloom’s Arcade, once sheltering shoppers from the elements. 60 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Summer 2008 JENNIFER BAUGHN Bloom blended old and new retail concepts in his shopping complex. He included the covered pedestrian arcade to protect shoppers from rain and heat and although this was a proven success elsewhere, it was new to Louisiana. Also new to the state was the combination of different services and entertainment in one building. And, significantly, Bloom had located his building in a spot that offered plenty of parking. This was becoming an essential component of retail planning. Yet, despite all these features and the great location, Bloom needed to give his building an arresting architectural presence on the street to entice shoppers into the covered arcade with its shops. He turned to architect N.W. Overstreet of Jackson, Mississippi, to provide that. Overstreet produced a design that was as modern in its appearance as Bloom was forward-looking in his ideas. The long single-story concrete building is faced with a buff-colored brick. While some of the shops had windows facing the street, the shops within the arcade that ran through the center of the building needed an eye-catching portal. This would act as a “billboard” to draw customers inside. So, Overstreet embellished the entrances at each end of the arcade with a bold ornamental front composed of vertical piers, alternately narrow and wide, that extend beyond the roofline to create a dynamic crown. Recessed panels between the piers are adorned with Art Deco designs featuring stylized floral and intertwining motifs made of cast stone (a fine-surfaced concrete). The wide piers that bookend this design include vertical panels densely filled with snake-like forms that ensnare rosettes JENNIFER BAUGHN

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008 Contents Friends Editor’s Column Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities George Rodrigue’s Louisiana: Cajuns, Blue Dogs & Beyond Katrina The Historic New Orleans Collection After The Flood Faubourg Marigny: The Creole “Suburb” Preserving New Orleans Jazz, One Generation at a Time: Conversation & Music with Tom Sancton Louisiana Foodways Louisiana Architecture Baton Rouge Photographs, 1863-1910 Jazz Notes The Ogden Museum of Southern Art Louisiana Association of Museums Nature of the “Beast” Louisiana State Museum Bookstand Sound Advice Forum

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Summer 2008

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