These two houses were built by free woman of color Lucy Cheatam on land bequeathed by white cotton factor John Hagan to their two sons. In many ways a typical example of Esplanade Avenue’s two-story, side-hall houses, these are smaller and have a more human scale than many others on this street. They also differ in being set back behind front gardens. Constructed of brick, plastered and scored, the houses have facades shaded by two-story cast-iron galleries, one ornamented with a pattern of grapes and the other of flowers; number 529 has anthemion cresting. Entrance doors are surrounded by Greek key architraves, and the square-headed windows are finished with molded lintels. The building contract specified marble mantels and wallpaper, the latter very modish at the time, for the parlors. Two-story brick service wings extend from the rear of the houses.