MOBILE, Alabama — Tucked inside the loop of the Interstate 10 on-ramp that curves toward the Wallace Tunnel sits a small, quiet pocket of downtown Mobile known as Fort Conde Village. Each morning, guests staying at Fort Conde Inn gather around an eight-seat dining table for coffee, fresh fruit and dishes like seafood eggs benedict, prepared to order by executive chef Robbie Dickson, before wandering a short walk up Royal Street to the reconstructed Fort Conde, the Museum of Mobile and the Gulf Coast Exploreum.
A mansion built in 1836
The inn occupies the Hall-Ford House, one of Mobile’s oldest surviving homes, built in 1836 by Edward Hall, a cotton broker who had come to the city from Philadelphia and later served as Mobile’s mayor. The Ford family owned the house for most of the 20th century before the city acquired it in the 1980s, after which it sat vacant and deteriorating for years. Architect Nick Holmes Jr., who helped restore the Hall-Ford House and several of its neighbors, calls it a raised Greek Revival structure with Caribbean and Federal-style influences and describes it as one of the most distinguished homes in Mobile.
A developer from New York takes a chance
Ahead of the nation’s bicentennial in 1976, the streets of the village were repaved with red brick and fitted with gas lamps, but the 13 historic buildings remained largely abandoned. The turnaround came when developer Larry Posner, based in Woodstock, New York, who had previously invested in Mobile and Pensacola apartments, leased the entire cluster of buildings from the city in 1998 under then-mayor Mike Dow, agreeing to pay rent based on a share of future leasing revenue. Posner has since restored 11 of the 13 structures, calling the Hall-Ford House the hardest project and the crown jewel of the village. Crews had to dig out the original floor and brick subfloor, replace it with reclaimed heart-pine wood from Mississippi and rebuild six columns across the home’s double front porches after discovering the structure was so unstable a chimney later collapsed.
A family idea turned inn
Posner credits the idea for turning the house into an inn, rather than office space, to his twin daughters, who told him as teenagers that offices sounded boring. He decorated the property himself, blending antiques with reproduction furnishings and drawing on his interest in French history. Upstairs, five bedrooms are each named for a family member and furnished with high thread-count linens and L’Occitane bath products, with rates starting around $149 a night. Additional rooms are available in a carriage house behind the main building, as well as in the Spear-Barter House, built around 1854, and the Antunez House, from 1872. Two cottages on the property, the Gonzales and the Blakely, see especially heavy demand during Mardi Gras season.
Looking ahead
Posner has two original buildings left to restore, with plans for one to become environmentally friendly apartments incorporating solar power and rooftop gardens. Holmes praised Posner’s persistence in reviving a site that had defeated other investors, calling him one of the most creative people he has worked with in Mobile’s preservation community.