Having matched the $20 million it decided it needed before beginning building its full-block Main St. arts complex, the organizers behind MATCH (the strikingly nicknamed Midtown Arts & Theater Center Houston) have decided to kick off construction work after an on-site event next Wednesday. The $25 million shared facility for more than a dozen independent arts groups (it was originally called the Independent Arts Collaborative) will go up on the 3400 block of Main St., also known as the former parking lot for the city’s former code enforcement building on the next block toward Downtown. The new rendering above of the design by San Antonio’s Lake Flato and Houston’s Studio RED shows the view from Main St. and Holman, looking north.
Here’s a fly-through in and around the main breezeway corridor of the 59,000-sq.-ft. collection of theaters and galleries and plazas and office spaces, starting from the same corner:
***
- Previously on Swamplot: Half the $28.5M Needed for Midtown Arts Center Raised; Grants To Spark Midtown Arts Center Fundraising; Midtown Arts Center Interim Design Review: How Do You Like It Now?; The Midtown Collaborative Arts Yurt That Got Away, A Second Round of Initial Concepts for Midtown’s Independent Arts Collaborative, Architects Agree To Collaborate on Main St. Arts Collaborative, Independent Arts Collaborative Buying Midtown Lot for New Main St. Arts Center
Rendering: Lake Flato Architects and Studio RED
Great, just add the Mid Main mixed-use apartment complex next door and we’ve got ourselves the heart of a neighborhood. The superblock could have been the heart, but plans for it are just a little too dull.
I can see this becoming bum central, if they don’t plan it right.
Would have been a good use for the Dome… Everything is Bigger in Texas… Including our love for fine arts
Cannot wait for this. Going to be awesome for the area.
They’re gonna have a heck of a time discouraging the birds from roosting.
I hope the karma of the mean ladies working in the permits office does not impact this new building. They were quite nefarious. I envision an artist, tripping on acid, walking down the hall one day at 3:55 and suddenly hearing a ghostly saying, “We’re closed – that’s not my problem.”