A look inside South Mississippi’s newest showpiece in the heart of downtown Ocean Springs
The small house The Traveler will soon occupy has a big mission, as it showcases the art and escapades of Walter Anderson and his family and grows the legacy of Ocean Springs as an art community.
The Traveler will open early next year as a living travelogue of Walter Anderson’s journeys, told in part by artists and crafters painting murals, designing Anderson furniture and crafting tiles that will add to the story.
It also will feature a Hen & Egg coffee shop and restaurant, with food and beverages crafted by Chef Nick Wallace. The Mississippi native appeared on “Chopped” and “Chopped Champions” on the Food Network and on season 19 of Bravo’s “Top Chef.”
The Traveler is adjacent to WAMA in downtown Ocean Springs and is the newest addition to the “art block” developing along Washington Avenue, at the southern edge of the city’s Arts & Entertainment District.
Anderson traveled the world, but always returned home to Ocean Springs, said Julian Rankin, executive director of the Walter Anderson Museum of Art. The draw of world adventures and the eventual pull of his roots in Ocean Springs will be captured in an immersive way as visitors sip a coffee or families play in the gardens.
The artists could have been commissioned to make an exact replica of the tile work Mac Anderson created for the Mary C. O’Keefe Cultural Center, the table with bluebird legs that Walter Anderson built or the cow mural he painted over the bathtub in his cottage. Instead the artists were encouraged to bring their own skills and interpretation of the Anderson works into their projects and make them familiar yet new.
“The project aims to integrate art, culture and community with a focus on preserving local history and inspiring new work.” Rankin said of The Traveler.
Shearwater tiles like dad’s
How different Ocean Springs would be if Annette McConnell Anderson hadn’t come from New Orleans in 1918 to purchase 24 acres of seaside property, Rankin said. She didn’t consult her husband about the purchase, at a time when women had far fewer rights, and she established an art colony that later was named Shearwater.
The family moved to the Coast town and brothers Walter, Peter and Mac turned the inspiration of the nature around them into their distinctive pottery, paintings and tile.
That began the town’s art culture, and now Anderson family members and other artists at Shearwater Pottery are creating several projects for The Traveler, like cicada sconces to flank the front window and a floating bar that is in the works.
Adele Lawton, daughter of Mac Anderson, worked with her father for years. She is crafting a wall of tiles similar to what her father made for the Mary C. O’Keefe Cultural Arts Center.
“This is going to be the biggest thing I’ve done,” she said. The 84, six-inch tiles are fired and individually painted with designs like a blue heron. The completed design will be the first thing people see when they enter The Traveler.
“That was fun working with daddy. He was very meticulous,” she said. While she brings her own flair to this project, “I’m influenced by daddy, because we lived in a house that he built, and everything in the house was decorated by him. So there’s no avoiding being influenced by his work,” she said.
Builder, potter, boatmaker takes on blue jays
Like Walter Anderson, Shane Sekul is part of a renowned Coast family, was drawn away to live other places and then returned when he missed the art community in Ocean Springs.
“I’ve never seen it anywhere else. It’s like, whether they do it full time, part time, weekends or whatever, everyone has this little niche of creativity here,” he said.
His niche is bigger than most. He’s a boat builder, a furniture maker, a potter and a ship captain who designed and built surf boards and paddle boards. All those skills are at play as he recreates Anderson’s blue jay table for The Traveler.
There’s the Anderson design, there’s the engineering that you’re going through to create such an intricate design, he said, ”and you’re actually using some of the boat building techniques.” He designs as he goes and frequently finds a better way to build the table.
“I’m glad I didn’t rush to do it,” Sekul said. He’s adding his own touches to Anderson’s table, making the top out of cypress, as Anderson did, but changing the legs that look like blue jays. The legs are tucked back on his table design, Sekul said, and he’s considering using birch and juniper bark as part of the detail on the birds when he carves and paints them.
Cows in the flowers
Her murals are at the Biloxi Shuckers’ stadium, on the streets of Biloxi and other places across South Mississippi, and now Julia Reyes is painting a corner of one of the rooms at The Traveler with a colorful mural.
“I was super excited about the challenge because I love Walter Anderson,”” she said, “but also to find out about the bike logs. I also love biking and I’m very passionate about the water and just exploring the environment.”
Anderson loved to ride and collected vintage bicycles in New Orleans. The collection will be stacked into a sculpture in the yard of The Traveler, Sekul said, and a vintage van will become the sign.
Before creating the mural, Reyes said she read about Anderson’s time in Texas and used that and the mural in his house to paint longhorns, birds and flowers.
“These are the white feather birds that he saw that were migrating through Texas at the time,” she said. They weren’t in his tub mural, but she decided to put them in her drawing, along with colorful blooms reminiscent of Mexican flowers.
A “tub couch” and photos of Anderson’s cottage will be scattered through that dining room. “It won’t be in your face, but it will be an exhibition,” Rankin said. So while eating their eggs, visitors can look around and see an object label and learn about the history encased at The Traveler.
Outside, pathways, interactive elements for kids and a French-inspired wildflower garden will make The Traveler an inviting place, Rankin said.
Restoration inside and out
They kept the wood floors and bead board of he original 100-year old house for The Traveler, Rankin said.
“The front looks the same,” he said, and where they had to replace planks of wood siding, they matched the original blue-green stain. The porch was rebuilt and two sets of barn doors in the house mimic those at Shearwater.
Mary Alice Owen sold the home to the museum and lived out her life there. When she died, they inherited a few cats, said Angela Mitchell, director of development and external affairs for WAMA, and The Traveler will have a cat house.
Dennis Cowart Architects in Ocean Springs built the entrance on the front of the museum and created a complimentary side porch entrance to The Traveler, with a polycarbonate gable.
An addition on the back of the house added accessible bathrooms that will be decorated with hand cut tile floors and block print mural on the walls for a coastal vibe.
Rankin envisions The Traveler as an entrance to the art community, where people can get a meal and get drawn into the Anderson story, explore the museum and The Creative Complex across Washington Avenue and be inspired to make a stop at Shearwater Pottery and Ocean Springs’ other galleries, shops and art experiences.
This story was originally published October 31, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
