Fairmont is coming home to New Orleans. The brand announced that reservations are now live for stays from November 2, 2026, at Fairmont New Orleans, its newest property and its 19th in the United States. The opening marks the grand return of the luxury brand to the Crescent City after two decades away, and the date is fixed: the hotel is scheduled to open on November 2, with bookings for stays beginning that day available now.
The address is a conversion with real architectural pedigree. The hotel occupies 17 stories of the former Bank of New Orleans building at 1010 Common Street, a 31-story landmark originally designed in 1970 by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. It stands in the city's Central Business District, steps from the French Quarter and the Caesars Superdome. The developer is Kailas Companies, the Louisiana commercial property group founded in 1990 by C. Mohan Kailas, which has built its reputation on restoring historic landmark buildings. Turning a 1970 SOM tower into a Fairmont is exactly the kind of adaptive reuse the city rewards: the bones are modernist, the ambition is grand-hotel.
Inside, the design brief is unmistakably New Orleans as Rockwell Group reads it. The interiors are guided, in the brand's words, by a celebration of the tension between built and natural environments, a defining characteristic of the city. Rockwell Group's scheme sets the tower's crisp modernist geometry against softer layers: cane, brass and velvet in deep, saturated colours, with planting and organic forms that bring the city's gardens and river landscape indoors. The lobby is conceived as the hotel's social anchor: a vibrant, ever-evolving gathering space anchored by a central Lobby Bar, meant to blur the lines between reception, lounge and cultural living room. Fairmont's properties trade on being the social epicenters of their cities, and New Orleans gives that ambition a natural stage.
Dining is the headline the city will talk about first. The hotel's restaurant and bar venues are created in partnership with Chef Emeril Lagasse and his team, the defining chef-brand of New Orleans dining. The centerpiece named in the announcement is Delmonico Steakhouse, dressed in 1970s-inspired decor for the lobby, a period nod that rhymes neatly with the building's own vintage. Trade reporting adds that the lineup includes The Cafe by Emeril alongside Delmonico. For a city that takes its food personally, putting Lagasse's name on the door is both a homecoming and a statement of intent.
Above it all is the roof, and Fairmont is not shy about the claim: a rooftop pool and lounge billed as the highest in the city, with views over the Mississippi. It is joined by Third Measure, an intimate rooftop bar, and Bleu Perdu, a poolside lounge. The 10,000-square-foot spa keeps the expected machinery of a luxury debut: three treatment rooms, a couples suite, a dry sauna, a steam room and a fitness studio, with vistas over the city. For gatherings, the hotel offers more than 19,000 square feet of meeting and event space, including two 4,000-square-foot ballrooms on the second floor with dedicated foyer space, six meeting rooms and an executive boardroom. Weddings, meetings and gatherings from 10 to 500 guests are the stated brief, and the grand ballroom, housed within the former bank interiors, keeps its heritage ceiling of local cypress wood with 1970s-era Italian-inspired chandeliers.
The 250 guest rooms and suites include Fairmont Gold, the brand's hotel-within-a-hotel tier, and the interiors promise boutique intimacy with a small key count and generously sized rooms. For the opening weeks, the property's site is already posting offers: a Discover New Orleans package with a daily hotel credit on stays of two nights or more, a bed-and-breakfast rate, and savings for AAA and CAA members, according to trade reporting on the hotel's listings. Stays earn and redeem in Accor's ALL loyalty program.
"Fairmont New Orleans is designed to reclaim its position as the city's ultimate celebration headquarters, blending historic charm with modern luxury. Our beautifully designed interiors exude local spirit, while our spacious, boutique-style rooms offer intimate comfort just moments from the Mississippi River with incredible views to match this privileged location. We are especially proud to honor our city's rich culinary legacy by partnering with beloved local icon Chef Emeril Lagasse to bring the sophisticated, 1970s decor-inspired Delmonico Steakhouse to our lobby. From grand galas to intimate gatherings, we look forward to welcoming guests to New Orleans' most meaningful new venue," said Eric Overstreet, General Manager of Fairmont New Orleans.
The developer is thinking in the same register. "With the upcoming opening of Fairmont New Orleans, we are thrilled to bring a legendary property back to life and a legendary brand back to New Orleans. Above all, we are most excited about sharing this spectacular hotel with our community. We have envisioned and designed it to be a vibrant, premier gathering place where people can come together to connect, collaborate, and celebrate, whether for business, social occasions, or major group events," said C. Mohan Kailas, Chief Executive Officer of Kailas Companies. Fairmont's chief brand officer, Claudia Kozma Kaplan, put the city's case more romantically: every room in the hotel, she said, feels like a love letter to the city. On November 2, New Orleans gets to read it.