Hanley-Gueno House

A shoe salesman, Minor Meriwether, built this stately, Italianate house after buying the property from Dr. Francis S. Mudd in 1901. In 1903, Joseph R. Jeanmard, brother of Bishop Jules B. Jeanmard, purchased the house for his family home. Joseph and family lived there for 65 years. Bishop Jeanmard lived in the house during the construction of Saint John Rectory, between 1917 and 1921. The Jeanmard family is credited with being the first to bring azalea plants to Lafayette, and some of the oldest Azaleas in Lafayette can still be found on this property. Much later, in 1968, Frank Hanley, a music professor, and Mr. Jeffrey Gueno, an interior designer, rehabilitated the house, carefully restoring the historic Italianate elements. Hanley and  Gueno lived in the house for almost 40 years. They are also well known for  creating the Baroque Neapolitan crèche that is still on permanent exhibit at Saint John the Evangelist Cathedral Museum. It took 30 years to purchase figurines, made in the 1700s by Italian artisans, and building the nativity scene and surrounding sets. The characters depict the Nativity scene as it would have looked during in the midst of daily life in Naples, Italy in the 1700s.