The mall for people who hate malls
The New Orleans Healing Center is a hip, not-quite-a-mall in a 55,000-square-foot building. Painted bright orange, it can’t be missed. The center is dedicated to promoting physical, emotional, intellectual, artistic, and environmental well-being.
It houses some things you might expect from its name and mission: yoga classes, a health club, and a food co-op. There’s also a closet-sized shop called Two Guys Cutting Hair, which is two guys, Adikus and Trent, who cut hair (brilliantly, according to reviews), and a boutique florist, Arbor House, run by two other guys who met as members of Mystic Mardi Krewe, a group known for their elaborate costumes and balls. Fatoush is the lone restaurant in the Center. They serve Middle Eastern food and, in keeping with the don’t-call-it-a-mall theme, claim to offer a path to inner peace that travels directly through the stomach.
Info
Address 2372 St. Claude Avenue, New Orleans, LA 70117, +1 504.940.1130, www.neworleanshealingcenter.org | Hours Tue–Sat 10am–6pm| Tip Nearby is a war monument for people who don’t want to stand in line to pay $24 for the massive World War II Museum in the Warehouse District. A carved stone victory arch (Burgundy St, between Alvar and Pauline Sts) honors residents of the Ninth Ward who served in World War I. The arch was the first memorial for the Great War in the United States.
But the calling cards that bookend the center are a Voodoo shop called the Island of Salvation Botanica at the front, and Cafe Istanbul, a performance center, at the back.
Salvation Botanica’s owner, Sallie Ann Glassman, once a nice Jewish girl from Maine, is one of the few white women ordained as Voodoo priestesses. Her store is stocked with “real” religious supplies, medicinal herbs, and Haitian artwork, as opposed to the made-in-China gris-gris and Voodoo dolls found in many gift shops. She also performs readings on the premises. Just outside Glassman’s door in the lobby is the International Marie Laveau Shrine, a nine-foot-tall statue of the Voodoo queen sculpted by Ricardo Pustanio.
Café Istanbul is a 3,800-square-foot hall that fosters and promotes performance art in New Orleans. They host live music, theater, dance, comedy, and film screenings. Monthly events include shows by the Moth, an open-mic storytelling competition, and the Goodnight Show, New Orleans’ take on Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion.
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