Before the Park, There Was the Building

LAFAYETTE, La. — If you've ever spread out on the grass at Parc Sans Souci for a Bach Lunch, or stood in line for a downtown festival with a drink in your hand, you've walked past it. The little building at 219 E. Vermilion Street sits right at the edge of the park, easy to miss between the splash pad and the live oaks. It might be the oldest surviving commercial building in downtown Lafayette — and it's the reason the park is called Sans Souci at all.

Sources don't agree on exactly when it was built. Some local researchers put it around 1840, while the city's historic register dates it closer to 1880. Either way, it was standing long before anybody was thinking about a downtown park.

An Inn on the Edge of Vermilionville

The building was put up by businessman Richard Chargois back when Lafayette was still called Vermilionville. At the time, the spot wasn't in the middle of anything — it sat near the outskirts of a small settlement, where roads were rough and stagecoach routes were just taking shape.

According to Downtown Lafayette's historical account, travelers were already using the building as an inn by 1840. That makes sense when you picture what this area was: a crossroads connecting New Iberia, Abbeville and Opelousas. It's part of why Lafayette earned the nickname Hub City.

Post Office, Grocery, Cobbler

After its inn days, the building reportedly served as Vermilionville's first post office before the Civil War. From there it did a little of everything. Historical accounts list it at various points as a restaurant, a carpenter shop, a grocery, a tinsmith shop, a shoe repair shop and even a newspaper office. The Chargois family held onto the property until around 1940.

The Building Was Almost Lost

In 1940, Mrs. Frederick Nehrbass bought the property — and according to its preservation history, that purchase is what saved it from demolition. She fixed the old place up and ran an antiques business out of it first.

Then came the chapter that gave the building its name. Mrs. Nehrbass teamed up with Edith Garland Dupré, one of the original faculty members of the school we now call UL Lafayette. Dupré spent more than 40 years in education, and the university's Edith Garland Dupré Library is named for her. In December 1943, the two women opened the Sans Souci Bookstore. The name came from Dupré's own home on Cherry Street, which she called Sans Souci — in French, without worry. Which is about as Acadiana as it gets.

The Park Grew Around It

Parc Sans Souci itself came much later, born of a downtown revitalization project in the 1990s that created or refreshed several public spaces, including Parc International, Parc Putnam and Parc de Lafayette. In other words, the park was built around a building that had already been standing there for generations — and took its name from the bookstore inside it.

A New Chapter

Around 2001 the building was restored again and became home to the Louisiana Crafts Guild's Sans Souci Fine Crafts Gallerie, which stayed more than 20 years before moving to a bigger downtown spot in early 2023. Ownership passed from the Downtown Development Authority to the Lafayette Public Trust Financing Authority around 2013 and 2014, and architects have since planned a careful rehab of the roughly 1,200-square-foot structure that keeps its historic character while connecting it to the park with outdoor seating.

Most recently, the building became the centerpiece of One Acadiana's Small Business Challenge, with the winning business concept earning up to $100,000 and a lease on the historic property. The challenge was won by Magnolia Pantry — the newest tenant of the oldest address downtown.

Next time you're in the park for live music, or making a beeline for the splash pad, take a minute and look at that little building on the corner. It's been an inn, a post office, a bookstore and a gallery, and it was here before Lafayette was even called Lafayette. Not bad for a building that almost got torn down.