House Floats Wrap-Up

This year’s Carnival season was much quieter this year. No parades with their marching bands and screaming crowds. No music venues packed with dancing patrons. Bourbon Street was closed. In fact, the French Quarter shut down liquor sales in the French Quarter for the final weekend of Mardi Gras and Fat Tuesday. But New Orleans managed to make the best of a bad situation and came up with some fairly marvelous distractions. City Park created a drive-thru parade – Floats in the Oaks – as a safe way to see the floats, maybe catch a dance krewe, and relive some memories. I got to dance twice with my fellow Pussyfooters and it was pretty great being able to make people smile as they drove by.

But is was “Yardi Gras” that really gave the city something to smile about. Another socially distanced version of Mardi Gras, Yardi Gras turned thousands of houses and businesses throughout New Orleans (and as far away as Australia and Abu Dhabi) into parade floats.

House Floats – Algiers

“Yardi Gras,” the 2021 socially distanced version of Mardi Gras, has turned houses and businesses throughout New Orleans into parade floats. The grassroots Krewe of House Floats promoted this safe parade concept, encouraging people to use local businesses and artists to help decorate their places, or go DIY, then register on their map. The Krewe’s founder, Megan Boudreaux, lives in Algiers Point and we found her headquarters, the USS House Float. I can’t imagine she realized thousands of people would create house floats as far away as Australia and Abu Dhabi when she first came up with the Krewe.  

I’ve already covered the Marigny, the French Quarter, St. Charles Ave.,  Magazine Street, the Irish Channel, Mid-City, and the Garden District and Lower Garden District.

House Floats – Marigny

If you read my last post of the fabulous costumes of Fat Tuesday, you’ve already seen a few of the house floats in the Marigny, the neighborhood across Esplanade from the French Quarter. “Yardi Gras,” the 2021 socially distanced version of Mardi Gras, has turned houses and businesses throughout the city (and even the world) into parade floats. The grassroots Krewe of House Floats promoted this safe parade concept, encouraging people to use local businesses and artists to help decorate their places, or go DIY, then register on their map. The spectacular displays by float artists like Kern Studios have turned one St. Charles Ave. yard into a circus and another into a jurassic park – with top hats and masques.

House Floats – Mid-City

If you’ve been following this blog, you know that New Orleans has been celebrating Carnival in a safe, socially distanced way. “Yardi Gras” has decorated thousands of homes and businesses as parade floats. Krewe of House Floats, a grassroots organization promoting this new parade concept, encouraged people to use local businesses and artists to help decorate their places as house floats, or go DIY, then register on their map. After we’d experienced City Park’s drive-thru Floats in the Oaks stationary parade, we drove around neighboring Mid-City with that map and spotted amazing displays.

Some neighborhoods have chosen themes and we drove many streets celebrating with variations on “how sweet it is to be loved bayou.”

Floats in the Oaks

COVID may have cancelled our Mardi Gras parades but New Orleans City Park has created a drive-thru parade – Floats in the Oaks – a safe way to see the floats, keep our spirits up, and relive some memories. City Park has gone to some length to recreate the parade experience – starting with circling spotlights, and a bead thrown through your open window as you show your ticket. There were unattended flambeaux poles burning and ladders strewn with beads lining the road. One area’s trees were covered in toilet paper, reminding us all of the Krewe of Tucks parade.

House Floats – Irish Channel

With the cancellation of Carnival’s parades, we’re celebrating Mardi Gras in place – converting thousands of homes and businesses into parade floats. “Yardi Gras” has covered homes in giant paper mache flowers, cutouts of crowds waving for throws, and huge beads.

Floats in the Oaks & the Pussyfooters!

I got to dance in a parade! Sort of. Because of COVID, the city has had to be clever about how to have a parade experience without creating a super spreader event.  New Orleanians have decorated thousands of homes and businesses throughout the city (and the country and even the world!) as “House Floats” to celebrate “Yardi Gras” – a stationary parade. City Park went literal with the concept – lining it’s winding roads with floats from nearly every Krewe that would normally roll so people can drive through the parade – Floats in the Oaks.

The Pussyfooters, a dance krewe of over 100 women over-30, have been invited to join for both weeks of Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Other dancers and bands will be appearing as well throughout the 2-week schedule. Thursday was opening night and I was pretty excited to finally be putting on my pink wig and corset.

House Floats – Magazine St.

Mardi Gras is essentially cancelled this year due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. But you can’t keep a good city down – and New Orleans is a great city. City Park will be hosting a drive-thru parade called Floats in the Oaks with floats parked on one side of the road and bands and dance krewes on the other. I’ll be dancing in a pink wig and corset along with my Pussyfooters sisters! Parade-goers are encouraged to costume in their cars so I’m hoping it’ll be a little reminder of the fun things we usually see while dancing past the miles and miles of crowds. 

Lately, the entire city is becoming a drive-thru parade.

Krewe du Vieux Parade (sorta)

Lost most cities, New Orleans is dealing with the COVID shutdowns – but only New Orleans is also missing out on dozens of parades. Carnival season started Jan. 6th and we all bought King Cake to celebrate, then stayed home to eat it. Chewbacchus and Krewe Boheme would’ve started the parades in the last couple weekends and the official-unofficial start of the parade season would be this weekend’s Krewe du Vieux graphically satirical parade followed by Krewedelusion. This year, emphasizing masking and social distancing, Krewe du Vieux created a “parade route” of homes, bars and other spots for people to visit throughout the city starting in the Audubon neighborhood, where people were encouraged to drop off canned food donations.

Mardi Gras 2021

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Mardi Gras will be unrecognizable this year. Most parades have been cancelled. A few have regrouped, creating drive-thru parades. The dancers, bands, and krewe members throwing beads and masks “parade” on either side of a road as parade-goers in cars pass. With no parades, people are taking their house-blinging to the next level this year. Krewe of House Floats, a grassroots effort to give neighbors a safe, socially distanced parade experience, encourages people to use local businesses and artists to help decorate their homes as house floats. I’ve already seen 3 homes done as floats and they totally brightened my days (PHOTOS below).