Featured Posts

01/25/18 11:30am

A Swamplot reader sends photos of the now see-through drive-thruÂ signage on the north side of Burger King’s former building at 1002 Westheimer, across the street from the Westmont Shopping Center home to Spec’s, Half Price Books, and a Mattress Firm. The restaurant abdicated earlier this week. Yesterday morning, surveyors showed up to look around the property, leaving behind the wooden marker shown at the bottom of the image at top.

Another shot from the fast food lane adjacent to Blacksmith looks toward the restaurant’s parking lot on California St.:

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Whopper

Fast Food, Montrose, Openings and Closings, Restaurants

Featured Posts

01/24/18 11:30am

Victoria’s Secret Has Taken Off from Highland Village

by Dan Singer

Openings and Closings, Retail

12 Comments

Victoria’s Secret is the latest retailer to retreat from the Highland Village Shopping Center. The photo at top shows the former underwear and other mentionables store at 3942 Westheimer dressed down with a sign outside announcing its closure — which took place this past weekend. The vacant storefront now blends in better with its neighbor, the former Joseph shoe store that shuttered late last year:

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Ex-Villagers

77027, Highland Village Shopping Center, Openings and Closings, Retail

Featured Posts

01/23/18 11:45am

Curbside Service Moves in Where San Felipe H-E-B’s Table 57 Restaurant Shut Down

by Dan Singer

Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Tanglewood

1 Comment

Note: Story updated below.

Thereâ€™s a new sign on a curved portion of H-E-B’s facade at 5895 San Felipe, marking a replacement for the former Table 57 in-store restaurant, which closed quietly sometime shortly before the new year. The supermarket’s new curbside service area is taking over the restaurant’s old space along the northwest corner of store.

Table 57 opened along with the rest of the H-E-B on the corner of San Felipe and Fountain View back in 2015. At the time, it was Houston’s first sit-down dining destination inside an H-E-B store. (The supermarket had already debuted similar venues in Austin and San Antonio.) The photo above shows the restaurant’s automatic entryway and patio frontage extending west towards Fountain View.

Here’s what the doorway to the former restaurant looks like now, stripped of its overhead signage:

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Cleanup on Table 57

77057, Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Supermarkets, Tanglewood

Demolitions

01/22/18 4:00pm

Exxon’s Brookhollow Campus Now Making Its Last Stand Along 290

by Dan Singer

Lazybrook

4 Comments

A Swamplot reader in motion along 290 sends photos of the late-stage demolition in progress on Exxonâ€™s former Brookhollow campus, now down to its last office building at 4550 Dacoma St. Tear-down began on the structure last July after a partnership connected to Fidelis Realty Partners andÂ Williamsburg Enterprises bought the 24-acre property just outside the Loop the year prior with plans to build a retail center on the site. The ruined 254,566-sq.-ft. structure is one of 3 office buildings that once stood on the campus.

A few more photos of the crumbling facility:

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Roadside Distractions

77092, Demolitions, ExxonMobil, Lazybrook

Briarmeadow

01/22/18 11:15am

Chinese Cafe No Longer Stirring in Its Former McDonald’s Spot on Richmond

by Dan Singer

Openings and Closings, Restaurants

5 Comments

A note taped to the window of Chinese Cafe announces that the restaurant at 5888 Richmond has shuttered. The counter-service spot took over its location between Chimney Rock and Fountain View from a McDonald’s after moving out of the shopping center 2 blocks east on the corner of Richmond and Sage Rd. in 2014. HS Green has since cropped up in the restaurant’s old shopping center storefront.

The photo at top looks east to show Chinese Cafe’s signage still shining beneath a starless sky last Friday, although the inside of the restaurant appears to have gone dark. The 3,756-sq.-ft. building sits between Taco Bell and the Houston Camera Exchange.

Photos: Rex Solomon

Briarmeadow

77057, Briarmeadow, Openings and Closings, Restaurants

Briarmeadow

01/19/18 4:30pm

New Card Den Coming to the House Where Fish & the Knife, Churrasca Brazilian Steakhouse Folded

by Dan Singer

Openings and Closings

No Comments

Something new is on the table for the building at the corner of Westheimer and Stoney Brook Dr.: Prime Social, a card and board game venue with an onsite restaurant. The not yet full house is advertising chess, backgammon, cribbage, and a number of poker variants — with 2 daily tournaments (up to “$5,000 GUARANTEED”). Also, “professional armed security” will be present on the premises, according to the house website, in case anything gets out of hand.

Churrasca Brazilian Steakhouse closed down in the 11,448-sq.-ft. building, pictured above, last year. The restaurant took over from sushi joint and nightclub Fish & the Knife, which shuttered in its newly-built space at 7801 Westheimer in 2014, 9 months after opening.

Raising the Stakes

77063, Briarmeadow, Openings and Closings

Featured Posts

01/19/18 2:30pm

How a Heights Salon and Cleaners Building Might Look Once It’s Been Burgerized

by Dan Singer

Houston Heights, Proposed Developments

20 Comments

Davis Commercial is showing images of a renovated building on the corner of 11th St. and Rutland in hopes of enticing a burger-flipping collective or something similar to take over the space. Q St. Salon & Boutique shared the 2,712-sq.-ft. building behind the parking-lot gazeboÂ with Heights Discount Dry Cleaners until the latter closed down last year. A bungalow that now sits adjacent to Q St.’s spot to the west (hidden behind the building in the photo at top) is excised from the renderings.

The rendering above shows the building’s windows wiped clean of advertisements for laundry deals and extended to the ground. New awnings are shown in place of the blue vinyl ones now covering the storefronts at 402 W. 11th.

An 800-sq.-ft. patio is also planned for the building’s frontage along 11th St.:

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Wash Cycle

77008, Bars and Restaurants, Houston Heights, Proposed Developments, Retail

Featured Posts

01/19/18 12:30pm

How One of a Pair of Replacement Bungalows on 22nd St. Will Work Out

by Dan Singer

Houston Heights, New Construction

1 Comment

Here’s the site on the block of 22nd St. bookended by the Vapor Gypsy e-cigarette shop and the Carl Barnes Funeral Home — and peppered with townhomes, an auto repair shop,Â and Refrigeration Gaskets of Texas — where 2 new row houses are about to be built. Wile Interests and Capital Realty are constructing the pair they’re calling the Bungalows on 22nd St. between Durham and Shepherd — in place of 2 dilapidated bungalows that were torn down on the same site last year.

A rowing-focused workout center called Crew Fitness will occupy the eastern bungalow in the development at 715 W. 22nd St.:

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One Oar the Other

77008, Houston Heights, New Construction

Apartments

01/18/18 4:00pm

Hanover’s Apartment Tower Now Digging into Its New Digs Across Kirby from Whole Foods

by Dan Singer

New Construction, Upper Kirby

2 Comments

Excavators are now moving dirt around on the corner of Kirby andÂ oak-lined Steel St. where a 39-story apartment tower dubbed Hanover River Oaks is planned. Hanover bought a 1.6-acre portion of the former Kirby Court Apartments along Steel St. in 2016; funding issues had left the project in limbo for most of the prior year. The photo above, taken from the highrise at 2727 Kirby, looks southwest past the corner tower of the Gables West AveÂ apartments to show a portion of the crater where the new apartment tower is now under construction.

Although the project has a Kirby Dr. address, the building won’t actually front the street. Instead, it will sit behind Becks Prime at the corner of Kirby and Kipling (partly visible in the bottom left of the image above). Earlier renderings showed a new standalone restaurant building fronting Kirby just south of Becks Prime. West of the drive-thru restaurant zone, an entrance driveway for the apartment will run between Kipling and Steel.

A recent rendering from architecture firm Solomon Cordwell Buenz views the tower from southeast of 2727 Kirby:

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Hanover River Oaks

77098, Apartments, New Construction, Upper Kirby

Featured Posts

01/18/18 1:30pm

The First Sign of Changes Coming to the Soon-To-Be Searsless West Oaks Mall Is Now Standing in Front of the Former Macy’s Parking Lot

by Dan Singer

Malls, Openings and Closings, West Oaks

1 Comment

A Swamplot reader sends this photo of new signage fronting Hwy. 6 along the vacant Macy’s parking lot at West Oaks Mall. The space left behind by the former anchor tenant — which closed its doors last year — will be turned into a new store called The Outlet at West Oaks that will specialize in clothing and home goods and open within the next few months. Dress shop Formal Gallery has been announced as the new store’s first retailer. Other additions have been announced for the rest of the mall, HBJâ€™s Cara Smith reports: a gym, a trampoline park, a daycare facility, a food hall,Â restaurants, event venues, and some sort of maker space.

1st Emporium, the real estate division of Houston-based Mehta Investments, quietly bought most of the mall — out of bankruptcy, Paul Takahashi reports in the Chronicle —Â last August. (The mall’s former owner, Pacific Retail Capital Partners, bought the shopping center out of bankruptcy, too, back in 2009.)

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Anchors Away

77082, Buildings for Sale, Department Stores, Malls, Openings and Closings, West Oaks

Featured Posts

01/18/18 11:30am

Amazon Will Not Be Delivering HQ2 to Houston

by Dan Singer

Quicklink

22 Comments

AMAZON WILL NOT BE DELIVERING HQ2 TO HOUSTON Despite campaigns that included coordinated office light displays and banner flybys over the company’s current headquarters in Seattle, none of the Houston proposals to house Amazon’s new campus made it past the first round. The company announced this morning that 17 U.S. cities plus northern Virginia, Toronto, and Montgomery County, Maryland would be finalists for the new HQ2. Among those that did make the cut: Dallas and Austin. [USA Today; map; previously on Swamplot] Photo of former KBR Building 3: Swamplot inbox

Proposed Develoments, Real Estate Marketing

Condos

01/17/18 4:45pm

Arabella Condo Tower Now Showing Off Its Colors and Contours

by Dan Singer

New Construction, River Oaks

11 Comments

Snapshots from the scenic Robbins Brothers jewelry store parking lot on the West Loop show how much progress has been made on the 34-story Arabella (formerly ArÃ¡bella) condo tower next to the Target parking lot on San Felipe. Construction on the bumpy building began in 2015 on a portion of the former Westcreek Apartments at the corner of San Felipe and Westcreek. The photo at top shows the new building at 4521 San Felipe towering over the 25-story SkyHouse River Oaks apartment building, as well as the 17-story Wilshire condo tower.

A closer view of the trio:

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In Height Order

77056, Condos, Highland Village, New Construction, River Oaks

Eastwood

01/17/18 12:30pm

Alexis and Hunter Pence’s Eastwood Gamer Cafe Looking Ready for Swordplay

by Dan Singer

Renovations

3 Comments

Replica weaponry is now up on the white brick building at 1318 Telephone Rd. ahead of coffee shop Coral Sword’s planned opening in the space next month. Backed by former Houston Astro and self-professed video- and board-gamer Hunter Pence along with his wife Alexis, the venue will include communal gaming areas, a private podcast and game session recording booth, and “a membership driven co-gaming space.” Record and book store Wired Up closed down in the building last year, and renovations have been underway on the space since last month. The photo at top shows Coral Sword’s main entrance and storefront window to the right of it.

The cafe will share the building with East End Barber, which takes up the southeast portion of the structure. Below, you can see the barber shop’s sign on the corner of Telephone and Fourcade St.:

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Waiting on Deck

77023, Coffee Shops, Eastwood, Openings and Closings, Renovations

Featured Posts

01/16/18 1:30pm

Heights Vinyl Skipping Out of the Heights

by Dan Singer

Houston Heights, Openings and Closings

5 Comments

Heights Vinyl is getting ready to box up its collection of grooved disks, turntables, and other analog audio items before bolting from the building it shares with Cat Veterinary Clinic at 3122 White Oak Dr. (The record store’s former neighbor and industry peer — 3mA Audio — moved out of the space directly next to the vet’s office last year.) Last April, an entity connected to developer Ancorian bought the 8,900-sq.-ft. strip — as well as the adjacent apartment building at 3110 White Oak.

On Sunday, Heights Vinyl announced via Facebook that it would be moving to a Fifth WardÂ warehouse building south of I-10 at 3301 Cline St. That building is divided into 2 tenant spaces — Heights Vinyl will take over the one shown below, fronting the parking lot along Grove St.:

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Fifth Ward Bound