The Higgins Hotel sits directly across Magazine Street from the National WWII Museum, and the museum built it to extend the story past closing time.
The hotel takes its name from Andrew Higgins, the New Orleans shipbuilder whose Higgins Boat carried Allied troops onto the beaches of Normandy and the Pacific. Dwight Eisenhower credited those landing craft with helping win the war, and the museum itself started as a tribute to the man and his factories. The museum broke ground on the hotel in December 2017 and opened it on December 6, 2019, at a cost of $66.5 million. It operates as part of Hilton’s Curio Collection, and profits go back to the museum to build its endowment and fund its education programs.
The building is new, and the 1940s atmosphere comes by design. Architects gave it an Art Deco exterior modeled on period buildings around New Orleans, and interior designers worked with museum curators to choose artifacts from the collection for display. General George S. Patton’s piano stands in the executive lounge, along with the Higgins Boat Trophy awarded to General Arthur Trudeau and a 1943 portrait of Andrew Higgins. The lounge is reserved for executive-floor guests and top-tier Hilton Honors members, so most visitors will need to hear about the piano rather than see it.
The rest of the hotel is open to everyone. Black and white photographs of the war years and of 1940s New Orleans line the walls throughout. The 230 guest rooms keep the theme without turning into a museum display, with wartime posters, clean modern finishes, walk-in showers, and large windows. Corner rooms look out over the skyline, and the top suites carry the names Roosevelt, Eisenhower, and Truman. Some suites include Victrola record players.
Each place to eat and drink tells its own piece of the story. Kilroy’s, the lobby bar, takes its name from the “Kilroy was here” doodle American soldiers left across Europe, and it plays period music under the game on television with replica infantry helmets doubling as lampshades. Café Normandie next door serves French-influenced dishes with some Creole and Cajun touches for breakfast and lunch, a nod to the Normandy landings. Rosie’s on the Roof, up on the top floor, honors the women who built ships, planes, and weapons on the home front, and its outdoor decks look across the museum campus to the Superdome and the Bollinger Canopy of Peace. Cocktail lists at both bars carry wartime themes. Provisions Market handles grab-and-go coffee and meals.
The hotel also works as a base for serious museum visitors. The museum is large enough that many people spread it across two days, and front desk staff can sell tickets and suggest how to split up the exhibits. Beyond the museum, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, the Contemporary Arts Center, and restaurants like Cochon and Pêche are a few blocks away. The Convention Center sits three blocks off, and the French Quarter is a short walk.
The Higgins stands at 1000 Magazine Street. Rooms book through Hilton, and the front desk can be reached at (504) 528-1941. The hotel offers garage parking, a fitness center, and digital key check-in.
