Polished Gem: A Look at the Refurbished Art House
In January, 2024, msh architects, llc completed the renovations at the St. Tammany Art Association’s Art House in historic downtown Covington after it sustained severe water damage from Hurricane Ida in 2021. EDGE of the Lake published a story by Liz Genest Smith, which discusses the history of the Art Association and the process of repairing the building.
“I’m ashamed to admit it, but I’d never stepped foot inside the St. Tammany Art Association’s Art House in downtown Covington before now. I’ve lived on the Northshore for a decade, and while I was certainly very familiar with the organization’s role as a hub for local and visiting artists, as well as host of countless festivals. arts markets, kids’ camps and classes for all ages, I honestly didn’t realize it resided in such a cool building. which is open to the community. It took mother nature’s wrath to open my eyes.
On August 29, 2021, just as the STAA (like all of us) was finally on the road to recovering from the challenges brought on by the pandemic, Hurricane Ida hit. She was tough on a whole lot of Northshore residents and businesses, mainly due to toppled trees, but the Art House seemed insulated from all that, nestled snugly in the heart of the relatively treeless historic district. After all, its over 225-year-old building had maintained its structural integrity through countless other hurricanes, not to mention the multiple catastrophic fires that ravaged the district in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
But as Cathy Deano, the current president of the STAA board, explained during my recent visit, the historic structure’s luck had finally run out. […]”