OFFICE MONOPOLY 
Note: Story has been updated.
Houston Business Journal reports that Office Max and Office Depot are combining into one global office force to be reckoned with. The $1.17-billion, all-stock deal between the two big-box paper pushers is expected to create a single company — with less overhead and less overlap, too, you’d think — that’s worth $18 billion. Also, the Houston Chronicle‘s Nancy Sarnoff reports that developer Ed Wulfe says that “9 or 10 of the 40 Office Depots and 19 Office Maxes in greater Houston are close enough to each other that one will have to close.” One of those, pictured here, is located in the strip center at Richmond and Kirby. [Houston Business Journal; Prime Property] Photo: Panoramio user Wolfgang Houston
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What’s the state of Houston? It’s right here: Fake is the New Real’s Neil Freeman redrew the 50 states, dividing them into parcels of about 6.2 million people so as to distribute electoral college votes more equally. The Lone Star State, this hypothetical map shows, has to be broken up. You’ve got Big Thicket in the middle, with Trinity, comprising Dallas and Fort Worth, tucked inside. Chinati expands up to El Paso along the Rio Grande. And you knew it had to be true: Houston stands alone.
You can see the new 50 states after the jump:
Design plans for the $18 million Emancipation Park overhaul are done, reports KUHF’s Pat Hernandez, and the work — including renovations (as this rendering suggests) to the gym, baseball field, pool, and community center — is expected to begin at the 10-acre Third Ward park this summer.
The same architecture firm that transformed Wilshire Village into the H-E-B Montrose Market across town has been pegged to redo 1910 International Coffee Company Building (aka Sunset Coffee Building), resuscitating the derelict shell on Allen’s Landing into use as a Downtown tourist attraction and kayak rental shop. San Antonio firm Lake Flato submitted this drawing of the building at the coffee-with-cream-colored confluence of White Oak and Buffalo Bayou underneath Main and Fannin to Buffalo Bayou Partnership, which plans to begin the project in April.
- Houston building steeped in history to get facelift [abc13]
- Plan to renovate city’s ‘front door’ to begin in April [Houston Chronicle]
- International Coffee Building [Buffalo Bayou Partnership]
Rendering: Buffalo Bayou Partnership
Note: Updated, with more demos.
The fewer they are, the harder they fall.
THE LUXURY POST OAK IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE NEXT TO MCDONALD’S 
Randall Davis has completed the purchase of (most of) the 1405 Post Oak property where that long-standing McDonald’s was getting in the way of his Astoria development (the rendering of which is shown here), reports the Houston Chronicle‘s Nancy Sarnoff: The McDonald’s that appeared in last Monday’s Daily Demolition Report is expected to be replaced with a smaller one near the edge of the 30,466-sq.-ft. 1.23-acre property, making room for the 70 28-story luxury tower — with 3-bedroom units going for $1.3 million — that’s being marketed as a path of upward mobility: “Davis has been luring investors through the federal government’s EB-5 visa program where wealthy would-be immigrants can put $500,000 or $1 million into a job-creating commercial enterprise and become lawful permanent residents of the United States.” [Houston Chronicle ($); previously on Swamplot] Rendering: Randall Davis Company
COMMENT OF THE DAY RUNNER-UP: THAT WORD HAS ALWAYS BUGGED ME, THOUGH “Fur-down comes from furring which is a construction term adopted from clothing. I think. But I’m not an entomologist.” [Jeromy Murphy, commenting on Comment of the Day: How They Covered Up the Garage Door Mechanism in the Exercise and Taxidermy Room]
COMMENT OF THE DAY: TENANT BUILDOUTS 101 “Southwest will essentially ‘own’ that space so long as they are in business (or at least until the space is so old it would need to be re-done anyway), so it doesn’t much matter who holds the title. Businesses routinely make modifications to leased spaces when they move in, often quite major. In most office buildings, it’s assumed that when you move in you’ll gut the whole space and modify to suit. Retail too. (That’s one reason for the 3-year minimum lease!) Many chain restaurants get a long-term land lease and build their building on it; it’s mostly a financing thing, and the land owner probably won’t kick ‘em out in 20 years; and if that happens, they don’t care, since that building’s not worth much at that point, and is probably in need of a re-do anyway. You don’t see it much in residential because there’s so many and various units people don’t need to modify to suit, they just find another place. Also, people are cheap, and residence is a money sink instead of source. But at the higher end, where a few bucks doesn’t matter as much, I think you’ll find plenty of modifications done by the occupant, or by the landlord as a condition of lease.” [melee, commenting on Southwest Spending $150 Million To Expand Hobby Airport for International Flights]
Not quite 3 years after reopening as what owner Rodney Finger claimed to be the biggest furniture store in Texas, the 600,000-sq.-ft. I-45 Finger Furniture flagship — and the 16.5 acres near UH that it sits on — has come up for sale. Until the Finger family bought the property in the early ’60s, it was home to a minor-league baseball stadium for the Houston Buffs, a farm team for the Cardinals up in St. Louis. That history was given some floor space among the couches and mattresses indoors in the Houston Sports Museum — with a replica home plate in the showroom tile to approximate the original. And the asking price? $11 million.
HAKEEM OLAJUWON’S MOON SHOT, A LONG WAY FROM THE GALLERIA 
The two-time NBA champ opened DR34M in December to showcase his line of luxury men’s sportswear, leather goods, and body lotions — but the 3300 East Nasa Pkwy. location struck some as unlikely: The Jim West Mansion? In Clear Lake? Where NASA used to study the moon? Houston Chronicle‘s Joy Sewing drops by to see what the baller has done to the old place: “[Olajuwon] took great care to maintain the integrity of the mansion . . . . The great room is likely one of the most impressive entry ways of any luxury store from Louis Vuitton to Hermès. . . . He commissioned an artist to add gold-leaf accents throughout the mansion. . . . In the west wing, the DR34M sportswear collection is prominently displayed in a room that features flooring from the Rockets’ 1995 NBA championship game.” And it’s only about 40 minutes south on I-45, far from Uptown: “It would not make the same impact (at the Galleria),” Olajuwon tells Sewing. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Candace Garcia
Meet Lasso, your mascot for the new Grand Texas Theme Park! The armed-and-friendly blond stud has been revealed as the long face of the Texas-themed theme park’s second-go-around in Texas. Back in July 2009, developer Monty Galland announced that he had a spot in Tomball for the park’s first phase to open by April 2010. Well, that was then. Now, Galland’s back — with Lasso in tow — and presenting a revised proposal to Montgomery Country leaders, reports the Tomball Potpourri: The developer’s eyeing property near New Caney, where Grand Texas might better hitch its wagon to dinosaur-friendly EarthQuest.
LET US NOW PRAISE FAMOUS MEN 
It seems as though it was just yesterday, but Presidents’ Day has come around again this Monday. Time to give these heads of state their due. Swamplot will be back as usual with more posts on Tuesday, February 19. Photo of David Adickes’s sculptures at SculpturWorx Studio in the Heights: Holly Middlebrook Pessoa
Ah, Friday: Why not take a stroll down Binz St. in the Museum District and have a look at what’s going on? Let’s head east from here: the corner of La Branch and Binz, near the Children’s Museum.
Our guide, Swamplot reader David Hollas, provides the photos and the observations:
Note: Photos from the listing have been removed at the request of the seller and the listing agent.
There’s no getting around the power lines, but there’s still a relatively unimpeded look to the south from the viewing deck of this 4-bedroom, 3-story house at 1322 Dart St. in the First Ward. Designer Charles Tibbits — working with architect Robert Hoover — alerts Swamplot to the house a block east of Houston Ave. and two north of Washington, near the Amtrak Station and the old Jefferson Davis Hospital. It’s listed at $1.5 million.
