3-D Glasses Change How You Look At Shotgun Housing

“The house gulped in a big breath of fresh air, like some frantic drowning thing breaking the water’s surface and gasping for life. It had sat unopened for so long, suffocating in the silence, it’s memories blanketed by a thick layer of dust.”
― Rachel Autumn Deering

When we think of our Shotgun houses scattered through Wards 1-4, we think of the ones that look like those pictured above. I invite you to enter my movie theater. Here are your 3-D glasses that will allow you to see the possibilities the Shotgun Houses provide. Word of caution: mention the word gentrification and you’ll find yourself out on the front sidewalk with the theater doors closing behind you. Crying gentrification is a sorry excuse to do nothing. Avoiding action is no longer acceptable. Sit back, enjoy your popcorn, and dream a little dream with me.

Blue Shotgun in Louisville: ALL Photos from Bob Villa-This Old House website

The sea-green exterior of this 1900s-era shotgun home is in New Orleans’ Bywater North neighborhood. Thanks to loving renovations, you can see the original refinished hardwood floors preserving its historical appeal.

As one of the original shotgun homes built in the Atlanta neighborhood of Reynoldstown, this petite periwinkle-colored home has retained authentic accents from the 1880s, while keeping up with the time with the addition of modern amenities. A vaulted ceiling and floor-to-ceiling fireplace coexist with stainless steel kitchen fixtures and ultra-fast Wi-Fi to offer the elegance of the old world with the convenience of the new.

This taupe shotgun home in New Orleans has vestiges of the Victorian era, from the transom above the front door to the ornamental violet awning. The historical details can be found throughout the interior as well; pine floors, and ultra-wide double doors.

Our Shotgun Housing doesn’t have to look like the photo above. If those living in neighborhoods full of these boarded up, deteriorating Shotguns, would get together and rethink their importance, it is a great starting point. Restoration will help eliminate crime, no longer having places to deal with drugs. it will help solve our housing problems. They are perfect for singles, young professionals, seniors, workforce housing, and for young families. Home Ownership can bring back pride in the faltering neighborhoods, make them safer places, where people look out for one another once again. EVERYBODY…put on your 3-D glasses and take a new look at these little jewels.

The shotgun house is the signature house style of New Orleans. This home measures 400 square feet. The single bedroom can fit two beds, and a dining area is squeezed alongside the kitchen. Don’t tell me there is something wrong with the gentrification of this Shotgun House. Paint and restoration is not a bad thing, the inference that gentrification is. Research shows that people welcome a revitilized neighborhood to continue living in. Let’s find a way to remove the layer of dust and let our Shotgun houses breathe again.

5 thoughts on “3-D Glasses Change How You Look At Shotgun Housing”

Many communities have learned the hard way that when you disrupt community bonds by tearing down neighborhoods or infilling with inappropriate housing a neighborhood dies street by street—then as each neighborhood dies the town becomes septic and dies from, corporate, intellectual and tax payer flight. The pictures in this blog show the benefit of the restoration and adaptive reuse of housing and business structures—which in turn reweave the torn fabric of the community. Moreover, it has been proved around the world that adaptive reuse saves millions of dollars and WORKS.

So Rocky Mount why are you still listening to your City Council? Do you really believe that they care about you? Look around you—open your eyes and minds—they only care about themselves. Don’t you think the state audit proved that?

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