This beautiful bottle contained the finest mineral water that New Orleans based S. Pablo & Son ever produced. It bubbles up circa 1860 during America’s mineral water craze, when spa towns dotted the landscape and mineral water was believed to be a cure-all elixir
Sebastian Pablo located his company just downriver from the French Quarter. It was on Elysian Fields Avenue near the main entrance to Crescent Park and along the river crescent that gives this legendary port town its “Crescent City” name.
Our good friend Mitchell Gaudet found the bottle while digging a privy at the Rice Mill Lofts, which overlooks the Mississippi River a few blocks from the S. Pablo & Son site. Gaudet sent the bottle to Sweden, where a precise carbon mold was made. And, today he casts these storied bottles in five marvelous colors at his famous Studio Inferno - a cadre of talented glass artists. Said one writer recently of Mitchell, "His intensely spiritual, cast glass pieces evoke the culture and rhythm of his native New Orleans."
International House celebrates New Orleans as well, and this S. Pablo & Son bottle – like the hotel’s design, its rituals, its art, its music and its cocktails at Loa – is one way we share a taste of this place.