One seemingly lost aspect of working-class life in antebellum New Orleans stems from the effort of entrepreneurs to provide bathing and swimming facilities for the city's working poor. In exchange for a relatively inexpensive fee per use, working-class New Orleanians served as the customer base for “floating pools” moored along the Mississippi riverfront. Beginning in 1836, these pools represented a transitional phase between the long extant tradition of bathing and swimming for free in the river and the development of commercialized, waterfront pleasure resorts for the masses in the late 1800s. Close proximity of working class neighborhoods to the river allowed New Orleans entrepreneurs to capitalize on restrictions city official began to place on bathing in the river. The floating pools represented an early stage in the commercialization of recreation as well as public hygiene.

Depuis sa fréquentation par les premiers curistes étrangers en 1820 jusqu’à l’édification du pont de Saint-Nazaire et de la Route Bleue en 1975, le paysage de la Côte de Jade a connu de profondes mutations. Terre inculte et délaissée à la fin du XVIIIe siècle, cette partie du littoral atlantique devient, dès les premières années du XIXe siècle, la destination privilégiée de baigneurs étrangers attirés par les bienfaits des eaux ferrugineuses et des bains de mer. Le charme pittoresque de ce paysage caractérisé par l’alternance de côtes escarpées et de longues étendues de sable fin sous un couvert de pins maritimes invite à l’évasion et au dépaysement. D’abord réservées à l’exigence d’une clientèle aristocratique et bourgeoise, les stations deviennent au milieu du XXe siècle le rendez-vous d’un tourisme de masse et la silhouette de la côte est profondément modifiée. Ces villes de bord de mer sont le reflet des grandes mutations de la société et répondent à des contraintes fonctionnelles, morphologiques et idéologiques liées à leur implantation géographique et à leur époque. L’habitat balnéaire, représentatif des goûts de son propriétaire et de l’enthousiasme croissant des maîtres d’œuvre pour cette nouvelle architecture saisonnière, consacrée au repos et aux loisirs, est conditionné par la présence de la mer puis du soleil. Malgré la diffusion de modèles de construction dans les catalogues d’architecture, la liberté d’interprétation de ces programmes crée une importante diversité stylistique, spécifique à l’architecture balnéaire. / Between the time that it was first frequented by foreign visitors taking the waters for their health in 1820 and the building of Saint Nazaire’s bridge and the Blue Road in 1975, the landscape of the Jade Coast has undergone significant changes. On virgin coastline that had been left undeveloped at the end of the 18th century, this part of the Atlantic coast became a favourite destination for foreign bathers in the early years of the 19th century, attracted by the benefits of chalybeate spring waters and the chance to bathe in the sea. The picturesque charm of this varied landscape, with its steep coast mixed with long sandy beaches and pine trees, was an invitation to enjoy an escape and a change of scenery. Having been initially devoted to the demands of an aristocratic and middle class clientele, seaside resorts became, in the middle of the twentieth century, the meeting place for large numbers of tourists and consequently the form of the coastline has been modified substantially. These seaside resorts reflect the profound changes to our society, and as well as being constrained by function, morphology and ideology, they are responses to their geographical location and to their date. Seaside housing reflects the taste of owners and a growing enthusiasm among developers for this new seasonal architecture dedicated to relaxation and leisure, architecture conditioned by the presence of the sea and the sun. Despite the spread of building models through architectural catalogues, the variety of interpretation of these models creates a broad stylistic diversity, which is specific to seaside resort architecture.