At a time when most 16-year-olds are hitting the mall or loafing with friends, Isabella Walker was going through the labyrinthine permitting process with the Historic District Landmarks Commission, State Historic Preservation Office, National Park Service and New Orleans Department of Safety and Permits.
In August 2024, her family members pooled their resources to acquire a circa 1900 Craftsman shotgun single in the Faubourg Marigny. The 1,350-square-foot two-bedroom, one-bath abode was in rough shape, its inherent gifts buried under decades of peeling paint, cracked linoleum and bad decisions.
“Isabella was designing modernist architecture on Minecraft when she was 6 years old,” Russ Walker said of his daughter. It was at that same age, while attending summer camp, that the precocious tot declared architecture as her future career. She has remained unwavering in her commitment to the practice. She graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School in the spring, turned 18 on June 19 and will decamp for Columbia University to study architecture next month…