Collector Stacey Hoover says her New Orleans kitchen is a place of activation
Words by Stephanie Burnette
Photos by Cedric Angeles
The Animals sang of a house in New Orleans called the Rising Sun, but it would pale to Bywater Wonderland. The address, at the corner of Royal and Desire, is home to a woman’s menagerie and Stacy Hoover approaches life with the heart of an ultra-creative.
The property today includes the original home of David Jackson, President of Jax Brewery, as well as a second house Hoover scooped up behind it. It’s akin to an artists’ colony or a Bohemian circus, or more likely both. Hoover is known for her themed annual parties with glittering guestlists, but as a consummate entertainer she believes any well-intentioned act, of any size, can be an event.
“I love sharing my space, if it’s inviting one friend over or a house full,” she says. “In the 1890s Mr. Jax would have parties and raise up the windows and people would dance in and out of them. I think he would want me to continue the tradition. The more people I can have in Bywater Wonderland the better.”
The kitchen beckons in a pallet of a Parisian pastry shop. It may look original to the home but it’s not. It was a boarding house when Hoover bought it, and the layout was more a series of pantries than a useful place to cook. Now the galley kitchen is enormously efficient and employs design techniques that make it feel seamless within the footprint of the home.
You would think the room was too narrow for an island, but Hoover built one with aplomb. It’s 98 inches long and 26 inches wide, marble-topped and pill shaped. Hoover says, “It’s kinda like a bar, in a way. I like to talk to people when I cook, so I wanted a narrow island with storage; teacups close at hand and glasses and snacks.”
Curved edges soften eyelines. The sink with its double side drains hails from Amish country and the vintage enamel stove was rebuilt to modern standards. A wide, antique mirror was a last-minute addition. Hoover likes the scalloped edge, the little chips, and the fading parts, and the light it draws into the room.
One wall showcases Franciscan Ovensafe plateware with antique white English Ironstone above it. Hoover remembers buying the first box of the pastel dishes at Brimfield Antique Show in Massachusetts. The pattern is Coronado; it was designed in California in the 1930s and produced for decades. She doesn’t know how many pieces she owns and is on the hunt for even more. An adjacent wall houses Fostoria glassware in brilliant rainbow hues and over top sits a collection of milk glass. Hoover is fond of the opaque tumblers, especially the footed ones. She uses them for parties both summer and winter and likes the lidded, footed compotes for setting around chips or candy.
Stacy Hoover’s most surprising trait is a lack of attachment to the things she collects. What lights her up is who might visit to use them. She feels drawn to bring like items together, not to leave them in faraway shops, but says that everything is for sale. Yep, read that again. Hoover is happy to purvey any object at Bywater Wonderland: the art, the furnishings, the sets of kitchenware. In her quixotic world, material possessions only exist to facilitate interconnection with others.
She doesn’t know how many pieces she owns and is on the hunt for even more.
“I am more prepared to share myself and my home when I collect things. If there are 500 milk glass teacups, I think, that’s perfect. I can have 500 people over to drink the same tea in the same teacups,” she says. “Even in my house, I must use things, get them down, give them life, activate them. There is no reason not to and every reason to. It lets people know anything can happen! If you tickle the imagination, maybe we can draw the world to a more playful state.”
