Lakeport Plantation: The Architectural Jewel of the Delta
What to know
The Lakeport Plantation house has been called the Jewel of the Delta. It’s not your typical plantation home tour. You won’t find a house full of period furniture. You won’t find decorated walls and carpeted floors. You won’t find a romanticized version of the South. Instead you will find a house that speaks for itself architecturally, along with unobtrusive award-winning exhibits that tell the stories of the people who lived and worked on the plantation –landowners, enslaved laborers, tenant farmers and sharecroppers, craftsmen and artisans, and even the restoration team that brought the house back to life.
Built in 1859, Lakeport is the last remaining plantation home on the Mississippi River in Arkansas and is considered one of the state’s premiere historic structures. Having escaped extensive remodeling in the 20th Century, Lakeport retains many of its original architectural features, brought back to life by a statewide restoration team led by Arkansas State University. The Greek Revival home is on the National Register and is a project of the Save America’s Treasures program and the recipient of awards through the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the American Association for State and Local History. The Lakeport Plantation serves as Arkansas’s southern anchor for the ten-state Great River Road National Scenic Byway.
Visit this site to learn how modern techniques such as microscopic paint analysis, ground penetrating radar, and dendrochronology came together with skilled historic finish specialists, traditional building tradesmen, architects, engineers, historians, and others to reveal the stories of the past.
Tours are on the hour Monday through Friday, with the last tour at 3 p.m. Saturday hours are available during the summer, from 11 a.m.- 2 p.m. May 25-Aug. 31.
