Peace, Love and Liberation: How New Orleans’ first non-alcoholic bar is redefining wellness
Dr. David Wallace opened Dream House Lounge as a zero-proof hub for mental wellness and spirituality in New Orleans. In this photo essay, Fellow Mandy Ortiz explores Wallace’s story and his work.
By Mandy Ortiz
Last Mardi Gras, I sat and talked with a man outside of Parkway Bar and Tavern. The man had grown up right around the corner from the Mid-City poboy shop and I had just moved to New Orleans the year prior. He explained to me how he’d seen a lot of people come and go in New Orleans, but the people who stayed in the city did so because New Orleans picked them. “You don’t pick New Orleans,” he told me, “New Orleans picks you.”
Dr. David Wallace, an educator and founder of Dream House Lounge, can relate. In 2019, Wallace moved to New Orleans from New York after receiving a job offer as the dean of a national graduate program supporting teachers and school leaders. Almost four years later, Wallace has found a place to call home, a tribe of close friends and community, and a new venture promoting wellness and mental health in his adopted city: Dream House Lounge.
I first met Wallace last summer at a book club focused on restorative justice. We spoke briefly about our lives and he told me that he was in the process of opening a lounge on the corner of Baronne and Perdido streets in the Central Business District. The focus of the lounge would be on mental wellness and spirituality. The offerings would include non-alcoholic cocktails — what Wallace calls “conscious cocktails”– and an oxygen bar where visitors can sit for a 10-to-20-minute session breathing in 95% pure oxygen infused with essential oils. I was intrigued. His choice to open Dream House in a city where alcohol consumption is celebrated and present in most spaces felt revolutionary. However, Wallace felt personally called to do this healing work here in New Orleans.
Wallace grew up in Belle Glade, Fla., the descendent of a lineage of Yoruba practitioners. Throughout his life, he told me he has been guided by his spirituality and practice. Wallace noted the concept for the Dream House developed over time, coming to him in a series of dreams in 2021. Those dreams later inspired the business name.
“When I had the dream to open this space, I knew that it was going to be an oxygen bar. The zero proof [concept] sort of came after the initial dream after hours and hours of meditation. I prayed to God, the ancestors, to my Orishas for clarity on this business venture. [Then] one night, at three o’clock in the morning, I had another dream about this space. I saw myself behind the bar making a drink, but I could not recognize the bottles,” Wallace said.
That was the moment Wallace realized he was being called to create a non-alcoholic space in New Orleans and began the work to open Dream House Lounge. The lounge opened for business in July 2022.
Local bars are a fixture in New Orleans, serving as meeting spots, places to celebrate and mourn, and as places to tap into community support. But when it comes to promoting and supporting mental health, alcohol use can be problematic. Research shows substance use and mental health disorders are often connected, and that interactions between the two can worsen the course of both. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, of the 20.3 million Americans with substance use disorders, about 37% have a co-occurring mental illness. The institute estimates 7.7 million American adults live with co-occurring substance use and mental disorders.
To be clear, that doesn’t mean alcohol use causes mental illness (or vice versa). But experts note that understanding how substance use and mental illness are connected must be part of the conversation around mental wellness and treatment.
In a city where the culture is deeply connected to drinking, Wallace saw a limited number of sober spaces and few conversations around the benefits of sobriety in relation to wellness. Wallace had heard about the growing non-alcoholic movement, with so-called “sober bars” popping up in cities across the United States. He reflected on his own relationship with alcohol after graduating from Morehouse College in 2011, and began to think about what an equitable and inclusive environment might look like for sober or sober curious people in New Orleans. Wallace saw an opportunity to cultivate an alternative space that kept all the community-building components of bar culture, while de-centering alcohol.
Opening a sober bar in New Orleans wasn’t an easy sell. Wallace said he visited almost 50 commercial spaces across the city looking for space for Dream House, but had most doors closed on him.
“Of course, there were things that I heard that had racial undertones, like ‘You don’t have enough experience’ or ‘We don’t believe in it’ or ‘Why would you switch from education to something like this?” Wallace recalled. “And so imagine trying to put forth something that you believe in, and people telling you that it’s a stupid idea. It does a number to your mental psyche, it does a number to your confidence, it does a number to your identity.”
Wallace relied on his close community–his tribe–to push through this difficult period. He called upon the spirit of his late grandfather, who passed away in 2016, to help guide him and remind him of his purpose in this healing work. His mother, Samantha F. Torrence, his brother, Brandon Torrence, and his sister, Andrea Torrence, frequently called to check in with him. Sometimes they flew into New Orleans to ensure he had the support he needed. His close friends in New Orleans helped him with everything from painting the lounge walls to developing the non-alcoholic drink menu. Wallace noted his tribe plays a major role in his accomplishments.
“They kept me going, they pushed me to dream big and exercise imagination,” Wallace said. “They were rooting for me even when I wasn’t rooting for myself.”
The power of tribes extends into every part of the physical space at Dream House Lounge, from the furniture and decor to the paint on the walls, which were all sourced from Black-owned businesses.
“All the furniture in the Dream House is in somewhat circular or semicircles. That’s to facilitate connection. That’s to facilitate community,” Wallace said. “I wanted to replicate some of the beautiful aspects of historic tribes.”
This includes the practice of connecting through the sharing and telling stories, a practice that inspired a weekly event series called Wellness Wednesdays hosted at the lounge. The series brings together local mental health professionals and community members for storytelling and discussions centered on mental health and wellness.
“Storytelling was something that we [also] know to be a historic way of not only passing out information, but giving people opportunities to grow and learn,” Wallace said.
The discussion topics vary every week. Recent topics include common misinformation around mental health, defining your personal metal wellness journey, healthy eating and meditative practices. Wallace noted he and invited experts try to pick topics that are relevant to and directly impact the people of New Orleans.
During these events, Dream House teams with local wellness partners such as Brightside Therapy Collective and NOLA Black Mental Health Matters to facilitate community healing circles, where participants join in conversation, journal and take time to reflect. Participants get a free journal and snack, and drinks and oxygen are available for purchase.
“This is a place to come and manifest your dreams. I knew that I wanted people to come here and dream big. I wanted people to quiet out the outside noise,” Wallace said.
“We deal with a lot here living in New Orleans. There’s a lot of negative news and I wanted to give people an escape, a place where they can come seek refuge and think about building that community of love, that community of peace, that community of liberation.”
To stay up to date on the latest events happening at Dream House Lounge, you can follow them on Instagram @dhlounge.
Mandy Ortiz is an interdisciplinary storyteller based in New Orleans, and a Fall 2022 Lede New Orleans Community Reporting Fellow. Ortiz, 23, was raised on the West Side of Chicago, the daughter of a Mexican mother and a Puerto Rican father. Ortiz graduated from Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn. and currently works in strategic planning and public relations.
This article is available to republish under a Creative Commons license. Read Lede New Orleans’ publishing guidelines here.
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