February 2024

Mardi Gras has many faces in New Orleans, depending on one’s vantage point. There’s the upper Bourbon Street version with raucous, sardine-packed crowds that’s been popularized nationally. Locals swear by the family-friendly Uptown and Mid-City parade route varieties, the amazing Mardi Gras Indian meanderings or the gay costuming competitions mid-French Quarter. But our own favorite Mardi Gras perspective takes place in the lower French Quarter and Marigny neighborhoods, where our journal’s office is located.

St. Anne gets the credit for starting the growing trend. More than 50 years ago, a group of artists started the Société of Sainte Anne, who revived the old-fashioned walking parades and dressed in outrageous and fantastic handmade costumes. Each MG morning, they paraded from the Bywater through the French Quarter, then to the Mississippi River. There, they consigned the ashes or tokens of loved ones who had passed during the year to the water rushing toward the Gulf.

Video of St. Anne’s parade 2024 by Isabelle Jacopin, Isabelle Jacopin Gallery, 829 Royal Street. 

In the early decades, the krewe’s march was a rare stream of dazzling color and fiery glory, flowing between banks of parade-goers dressed in street clothes. Through the decades, other local walking krewes formed, inspired by St. Anne. Today there are dozens. With more debuting every year.

And the costuming code has caught on with spectators who aren’t in a krewe. Nearly all locals and many visitors from far-flung places don festive get-ups just to watch. The better and more inventive the costume, the higher one’s status for the day. So on Mardi Gras day, the entire lower Quarter becomes a wildly spinning kaleidoscope of color and good cheer.

- photos by Ellis Anderson and Gregg Martel

Note: For optimum viewing, enjoy this feature with a large-screen device.  Unattributed photos by Ellis Anderson 

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