Clothiers and Furnishers
By the mid-nineteenth century, there were several stores in town selling ready-made and custom-made clothing to the citizens of New Orleans. Proprietors of dress shops and men’s furnishings stores made regular trips to fashion centers in the United States and abroad to purchase the best stock in the latest styles. Madame Olympe, the preeminent dressmaker in New Orleans, journeyed to Paris every year to bring back textiles, accessories, and trained dressmakers. The clothier and furnisher B. T. Walshe regularly traveled to New York to buy the original stock for his store. By the turn of the twentieth century, there were stores that specialized in linen suits, hats, and sturdy shoes—the items necessary for dressing fashionably in the hot, damp city.
Madame Olympe Boisse (active 1851–85)
Olympe Boisse opened her fashionable millinery and dressmaking shop on Chartres Street in 1851. She moved to Canal Street in 1864 and remained in business there for two decades. Madame Olympe was the best modiste in the city, offering gowns, bonnets, wraps, and artificial flowers of the highest quality and in the latest styles. At the end of each summer, she traveled to Paris, returning in the fall with dresses, fabrics, and accessories in the current fashions, as well as skilled dressmakers to create custom clothing for the women of the city. She is known as one of the first American dressmakers to apply her own label to the clothes she sold.
D. Mercier (active ca. 1850–76); D. Mercier’s Sons (1883–1925?)
Dominique Mercier, a free person of color, started a shoe business at the corner of Dauphine and Bienville Streets sometime before the Civil War. After the war, Mercier demolished the one-story shop and built a larger structure to house his business, which had grown to include a full line of men’s and boys' clothing. His sons, Joseph A., Jen L., and William J., took over the store in the late 1870s and officially changed the name to D. Mercier’s Sons in 1883. One of the largest men’s clothiers and furnishers in the city, D. Mercier’s Sons sold clothing, hats, and shoes at very affordable prices. The Mercier family also ran a real estate investment business and owned a large amount of property along Dauphine Street.
B. T. Walshe (active 1868–81)
Blayney T. Walshe emigrated from Ireland with his parents and began working in a New Orleans clothing store as a boy. After serving in the Confederate army, Walshe returned to New Orleans and opened his own store on Canal Street in 1868. B. T. Walshe’s was known for its fair prices, money-back return policy, and fashionable clothing. Walshe made yearly trips to New York to select new stock for his store. He retired from the business in 1881 to pursue a career in local politics.
Terry & Juden (1885–1980s)
Terry & Juden was a fine men’s clothing store on Carondelet Street, specializing in linen suits, straw hats, and monogrammed shirts for well-dressed men in the hot southern city.
