Lucille Ball & Douglass Freret

What did Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz have in common with New Orleans architect Douglass V. Freret (1903-1973)? Check out the plantation shutters catalog Freret once kept in his Gravier Street architectural office. It is one of some 1,000 building trade catalogs being digitized this summer by the Association for Preservation Technology International.

Image above:  Devereux Products Company. Plantation Shutters Selected by Lucy and Desi for Their Desert Dream House. Santa Monica, CA: The Company, postmarked 1955.