Blue Plate Building: Recent Addition to the National Register of Historic Places

Photo by Thirdthis

Added to the National Register in October 2008, the Blue Plate Building at 1315 S. Jefferson Davis Pkwy is a three-story, concrete food-processing facility occupying a city block. Built in 1942-43 from the designs of local architect August Perez, Jr., the building embodies all the textbook characteristics of the Streamline Moderne style. It has a dramatic, streamlined horizontal form; ribbon windows; curving glass block windows; a flat roof; and a smooth, gleaming white surface devoid of ornamentation. While Louisiana retains about 40 major Art Deco buildings, there are only six or seven major Streamline Moderne buildings in the state. Of these the Blue Plate Building is the most conspicuous (due to its size) and is considered Louisiana’s finest expression of the Streamline Moderne taste.

Poster’s note: a local developer intends to convert the building into a mixed-income apartment building.

Text by Patricia L. Duncan, National Register Coordinator, Louisiana Division of Historic Preservation and originally printed in the September 2009 issue of Preservation in Print.

Click here to view PRC’s photos of the Blue Plate Building.