Four buildings occupy the block at Burgundy and Mandeville streets in the Marigny, and every one of them spent over a century serving God before they started serving hotel guests. Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Church opened in 1860 to handle the neighborhood’s English-speaking Catholics, most of them Irish immigrants who needed somewhere to pray that wasn’t in French. A rectory went up around 1875, a convent in 1890, and a schoolhouse in 1900. For the next hundred years, priests said Mass, nuns taught children, and the whole operation hummed along until suburbs pulled the congregation away and the buildings went dark.
The church closed in 2001. The school had already shut down in 1993. By the time developer Nathalie Jordi walked through the property in the early 2010s, vines were growing through windows, and the place looked ready for demolition. She saw something else.
Hotel Peter and Paul opened in late 2018 after a four-year, $20 million restoration that kept the bones of all four buildings and turned classrooms, bedrooms, and prayer rooms into 71 hotel rooms spread across the campus. No two rooms look identical. The design firm ASH NYC worked with local architects from studioWTA to preserve original cypress wood moldings, marble fireplaces, and the church’s stained glass windows while adding antiques bought at European flea markets and custom furniture built by New Orleans craftspeople.
Rooms in the Schoolhouse are the most compact, with gingham curtains and chairs in colors pulled from 14th-18th century religious paintings. Some have spiral staircases leading to sleeping lofts under the eaves. Rooms in the Rectory feature canopy beds draped in cardinal red and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a courtyard filled with ferns. The Convent rooms use a white and royal blue palette with bespoke furniture and clawfoot tubs in some units.
Former classrooms and the school theater became guest rooms. The old gymnasium on the third floor is now a library lounge with books from local shop Blue Cypress Books and a trompe l’oeil mural by decorative artist Ann Marie Auricchio depicting scenes from a 19th-century play performed at the school when it first opened.
The Elysian Bar operates in the former rectory, run by the team behind Bacchanal Wine Bar. Bon Appetit named it one of America’s best new restaurants in 2019. The menu leans Mediterranean and European with New Orleans flourishes, heavy on shareable plates like whole roasted Gulf shrimp and red heirloom grits. Live music plays every night, and the bar program focuses on low-proof cocktails and spritzes. You can eat in the dining rooms that used to be parlors for priests, or sit in the brick courtyard where stained glass from the church casts colored light across the tables.
Sundae Best ice cream shop operates in what was the nuns’ quarters, serving small-batch flavors made with local ingredients. It’s about the size of a closet, hence the “jewel box” description you’ll see everywhere.
A sun room modeled after Claude Monet’s Giverny house serves as the hotel cafe, with coffee and pastries in the morning and plants on custom shelves built by local woodworker Matthew Holdren. There’s an honor bar in the third-floor lounge where you can pour yourself a drink and leave cash.
The church itself doesn’t house guest rooms. It’s been deconsecrated and now operates as an event space for weddings, concerts, yoga classes, and whatever else can fit under those vaulted ceilings with the stained glass throwing red, green, and yellow light across the floor. Architect Henry Howard designed the building, and Travel & Leisure named the hotel one of the top new properties of 2019.
Parking costs $10 a night in a gated lot. Check-in starts at 3pm, checkout at 11am. Room rates start around $115 and climb past $1,200 depending on which building you’re in and when you’re visiting. Mardi Gras pricing is a different animal.
A pool is scheduled to open in early 2026 with a Byzantine mosaic featuring an alligator, because this is still Louisiana even when you’re sleeping in a convent.
Hotel Peter and Paul sits five minutes on foot from Frenchmen Street’s jazz clubs and about 15 minutes walking to the French Quarter. It’s in a residential neighborhood, so it’s quieter than staying near Bourbon Street. Coffee shops, bars, and restaurants are within a few blocks. Uber to the Quarter runs around $8.
John Kennedy Toole mentioned the school in “A Confederacy of Dunces,” and allegedly had a three-person funeral in the church, though that story might be made up. Either way, the building has history that predates the hotel, and the restoration made sure you can still see it in the peeling paint on wooden doors and the creaking staircases that haven’t been sanded smooth.
Hotel Peter and Paul, 2317 Burgundy Street, Faubourg Marigny. Phone: (504) 356-5200. Rates from $115. Pool opening early 2026. Parking $10/night. The Elysian Bar open for brunch and dinner, Sundae Best ice cream shop on-site.
