D. H. Holmes was a

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store under one roof, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store mad ...

and later a New Orleans–based chain of department stores. The company was founded in 1842 by Daniel Henry Holmes, after whom it is named.Holmes High School history page
Retrieved December 20, 2006. In 1849 he moved his headquarters to

Canal Street Canal Street may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Canal Street (Manchester), Manchester, England * Canal Street, Oxford, Jericho, Oxford, England United States * Canal Street (Buffalo), a street and district at the western terminus of the Er ...

, where he developed his first department store.Sonesta Hotel's History page
Retrieved September 22, 2006. He followed the model of pioneering department stores in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

and

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

to offer his customers the best products and services. D.H. Holmes's main building on Canal Street was long considered a landmark. By the end of the 19th century, it was the largest department store in the

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both west and east. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

, with customers being served by more than 700 employees. Meeting under its clock, located on the Canal Street facade, was a popular rendezvous when this part of the city was a major shopping area. In the first scene of the

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...

-winning novel, ''

A Confederacy of Dunces ''A Confederacy of Dunces'' is a picaresque novel by American novelist John Kennedy Toole which reached publication in 1980, eleven years after Toole's death. Published through the efforts of writer Walker Percy (who also contributed a foreword) ...

'' by

John Kennedy Toole John Kennedy Toole (; December 17, 1937 – March 26, 1969) was an American novelist from New Orleans, Louisiana, whose posthumously published novel, '' A Confederacy of Dunces'', won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981. At 16 in 1954, Toole ...

, the character Ignatius Reilly agrees to meet his mother at the clock. In the 1970s the store employed artist

Charles Kerbs Matt may refer to: *Matt (name), people with the given name ''Matt'' or Matthew, meaning "gift from God", or the surname Matt *In British English, of a surface: having a non-glossy finish, see gloss (material appearance) *Matt, Switzerland, a mu ...

, who designed an Art Nouveau-style mural for the company as well as elaborate holiday window displays. In 1989 D.H. Holmes was purchased by

Dillard's Dillard's, Inc. is an American department store chain with approximately 267 stores in 29 states and headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas. Currently, the largest number of stores are located in Texas with 57 and Florida with 42. The company a ...

, one of numerous mergers among retail stores.AP: "Dillard to Buy D. H. Holmes"
''New York Times'', 1989, Retrieved September 22, 2006. The former main store of D.H. Holmes was redeveloped as a

boutique hotel Boutique hotels are small-capacity Hotel, hotels that provide more personalized service than typical hotels. They typically have fewer than a hundred rooms, and are considered more "trendy" and "intimate", often due to their location in urban ar ...

and opened in 1995 as the Chateau Sonesta Hotel. It completed a major renovation of all guest rooms, lobby, swimming pool, bar, and meeting spaces in May 2012, and is now the Hyatt French Quarter Hotel, managed by HRI Lodging.

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External links

D.H. Holmes lost a U.S. Supreme Court case on use tax in 1988D.H. Holmes toy department, about 1930
Defunct department stores based in Louisiana Retail companies established in 1842 History of New Orleans Companies based in New Orleans Retail companies disestablished in 1989 {{US-retail-company-stub

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