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Adaptive Reuse
12/28/16 2:45pm

Interior of EaDo Interior Design Shop Art Hous Scooped Out To Make Room for Burgr Hous

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East Downtown, Restaurants
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Art Hous, 811 St. Emanuel St., East Downtown, Houston, 77003
wahlburgers

The folks at ACS studio architecture say that the insides of the former Art Hous art and interior design center on St. Emanuel St. are being cleared out for the planned installation of Burgr Hous. Demo permits for the interior walls of the space, which is wedged between Warehouse Live and Lucky’s Pub, came through early last month. When it’s wrapped up, the remodel may have a vibe kinda like the space shown above, which ACS currently has up on their website for the project as a visual reference for the redesign — though the image depicts the branding of the Boston-based reality-teevee-starring Wahlburgers chain. The firm has a floorplan out as well, however, showing a different layout:

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E-Less in EaDo
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Featured Posts
12/28/16 11:30am

Original 59 Diner Building Now Open Again as 24-Hour Mexican, Breakfast Spot

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Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Upper Kirby
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El Beso Cantina, 3801 Farnham St,, Upper Kirby, Houston, 77098

A reader on the inside sends a shot of the ex-59 Diner on Farnham St., now up and running as El Beso Cantina. As of Christmas, the space is once again open 24 hours a day, though the pale turquoise paint and Elvis kitsch have been swapped out for warmer earth tones and decorative sombreros. The new occupants also appear to be attempting to fill the area’s 3am pancake niche, covered for nearly 30 years by the departed diner, by offering an array of American breakfast items along with the Tex-Mex fare.

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Shepherd Triangle Swap-In
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Featured Posts
12/27/16 5:00pm

A Quick Flyover of Houston’s New Used Car Vending Machine Midrise

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Carvana vending machine, 10939 Katy Fwy., Memorial, Houston, 77079

Along with starting up service at the new 8-story glass car dispensation machine on the former Big Tex Tree Nursery lot on I-10 this month, Carvana has released a bit of drone footage of the new facility (shown above). It doesn’t show the tower in action (though a video of a coin-triggered run-through of the original Nashville machine, which boasts only 5 stories of car-storage tower space, can be found here). The fly-by does show off some new grassy parking lot landscaping and the billboard that Carvana leased out to explain themselves, as well as a few of the residences on Lasso Ln. directly behind the machine. (That’s the east-bound Katy Fwy. on the left, with the flying ramps of Beltway 8 visible in the early morning haze.)

Photo of Carvana facility at 10939 Katy Fwy.: elnina via Swamplot Flickr Pool

Video: Carvana

I-10 Stackup
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Art
12/27/16 3:30pm

Still Life of Downtown Chronicle Building Rubble, and Other Masterworks of Deconstruction

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Demolitions
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Painting by Ken Mazzu

Artist Ken Mazzu’s been back at the easel and back on the Houston demolition beat lately, finishing up some new works to be featured in next month’s building-themed art show at the William Reaves / Sarah Foltz Fine Art Gallery at 2143 Westheimer Rd.. The show will feature some of Mazzu’s paintings of ’round-town teardowns, along with works of 2 other Houston-focused artists (late photographer Jim Culberson and living painter Richard Stout). The gallery will even host Houston archi-historian Dr. Stephen Fox for a talk about The Changing City on the 14th.

Mazzu’s had a lot of subjects to choose from since a set of his demo-themed canvases went on display back in 2013; he sends over some previews of new pieces, including the scene above commemorating the disassembly of the former Downtown headquarters of the Houston Chronicle. Other recent works feature newly-parking-lotified 509 Louisiana St., the dissolution of the octagonal Solvay mid-rise, a pile of post-blow-up downtown Foley’s debris, and more:

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New Works Retrospective
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Carlton Woods
12/27/16 12:00pm

A NSFW Musical Tour of Theresa Roemer’s Strip-Clubified 3-Story Closet Mansion, Starring Gucci and Gucci Mane

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Homes for Sale, Interiors, The Woodlands
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Gucci Mane's 'Nonchalant' at 47 Grand Regency Cir., Carlton Woods

The main star of Atlanta rapper Gucci Mane’s newly-released music video for the song Nonchalant is arguably the townhome-sized closet in Lamar and Theresa Roemer’s Woodlands mansion, still up for grabs since its 2014 listing. It’s the swankiest rap stripper video filmed in The Woodlands all year!

The Roemers bought the home in 2013 and spent a couple million renovating it, including the addition of the 3-story closet-slash-wet-bar-slash-charity-party-venue. The closet was visited by a writer for Neiman Marcus’s blog in 2014, shortly after which a burglar stopped in — then attempted to blackmail Roemer into buying her own stuff back. Theresa Roemer listed the house herself at the end of 2014, after which it went on the market a few times (most recently for $7.95 million, down from an original asking price of $12.9 million). The place was supposed to be auctioned off last summer, but wasn’t; Platinum Luxury Auctions’s listing for the house does, however, imply that a new auction date might be set for this spring.

Much of the new video is set within the closet, as well as in the connecting full bath with garden tub (which gets some PG-13- to R-rated action):

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Nonchalant in Carlton Woods
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Featured Posts
12/22/16 4:00pm

Get Your Votes In for the 2016 Swampies, Now Through Tuesday

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Notices
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Hey, wait! One last thing before we dash off for the holiday — now’s a great time to make sure you’ve voted for all 8 of the categories in this year’s Swamplot Awards for Houston Real Estate!

Swamplot Awards for Houston Real Estate Ribbon LogoAll votes are due in by 5pm Tuesday, December 27th — so you’ve got all weekend to whip up support from friends and family for your favorite nominees, too. As a quick recap of the awards at stake, here’s the complete list of this year’s official ballots, built out of your thoughtful and entertaining nominations:

For the complete guidelines on how to stuff the ballot boxes with all 4 of your votes for each category — that’s once each by comment, by email, by Comet and Vixen Facebook and Twitter  — check out this explainer page. Now vote away, vote away, vote away, all!

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Featured Posts
12/22/16 3:30pm

Merry Thursday to All, and to All a Good Weekend!

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Notices
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Hermann Park Lake in December

Merry Christmas! Happy Chanukah! Swamplot is skipping off a little early to go get into the spirit of the holiday, uh . . . “season,” such as it is. We wish you a joyous and peaceful remembrance of whatever brings you and yours together this time of year, be it Kwanzaa, Boxing Day, or the birthday of Emperor Akihito. We’ll meet you guys back here on Tuesday to wrap up that last bit of 2016 together.

Photo of Hermann Park and refurbished Memorial Hermann seasonal lighting: Meredith Nudo

Deck the Halls, Crank the AC
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Featured Posts
12/22/16 12:00pm

Abandoned Orphan Oil Wells Around Town Wait For Closure

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Maps
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Texas RRC orphaned wells, by Luke Whyte for the Texas Tribune

Texas RRC orphaned wells, by Luke Whyte for the Texas TribuneThe map above (a snap from Luke Whyte’s click-and-zoom-able original version, published this week by the Texas Tribune) shows the abandoned oil and gas wells scattered in and around the Houston area, per the official accounting of the Texas Railroad Commission. The state agency (which has had nothing to do with railroads since 2005) regulates pipelines, oil, and gas, and keeps tabs on so-called “orphaned wells” whose original owners have stopped keeping tabs on them for one reason or another, writes Jim Malewitz this week — the ones that were reported in the first place, that is. Kerry Knorpp, formerly on a defunct state committee overseeing oilfield cleanup efforts, also tells Malewitz that “there is about to be a tsunami of [newly] abandoned wells — wells were drilled at $110 oil that you would have never completed otherwise.”

The shaded hexagons above are meant to help show the density of those holes, not the degree to which they might pose a pollution hazard (though the agency ranks each well by its hazard potential, too, to help it decide which ones to plug up first, of the more than 10,000 currently on the docket).

Just what kind of hazards can a bunch of abandoned holes pose, anyway?

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Boom and Bust
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Bellaire
12/21/16 11:15am

S. Rice Readies for Triple Chicken Fight in the Walmart Parking Lot(s)

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Gulfton, Retail
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Triple Chicken junction on S. Rice, Gulfton, Houston, 77081

The density of fast-food chicken options at S. Rice Ave. just south of 59 is increasing precipitously, a couple of readers note. The most recent addition: the newly-constructed Chik-Fil-A at 5325 S. Rice Ave. (visible above on the right, just south of Pollo Loco and across the street from Raising Cane’s). The Chik-Fil-A is not yet officially open for fowl distribution (though it does appear to be giving away prizes on Facebook. The Pollo Loco and Chik-Fil-A represent the fulfillment of the Wal-Mart Supercenter version of the Shoppes at Uptown Crossing site plan, passed around back in 2014; the Marriott Town & Place shown on that plan has since come to be as well:

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Flocking Together in Gulfton
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Featured Posts
12/20/16 12:30pm

Rice Confirms Redirect Toward Classically-Skinned Opera House

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Rice University
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rice-opera-proposed

Proposed Opera House, Rice University, Houston, 77005Rice University announced this week that the opera house it plans to build in the parking lot next to the Shepherd School of Music will, in fact, be designed by the classic-leaning architecture firm of Allan Greenberg — and formally released what appear to be a couple of the same renderings that Swamplot posted back in June, after a reader’s encounter with the above presentation materials on campus. Like the Baker Institute, the design looks to be covered over in classic-ish details more or less reminiscent of Rice’s older buildings; the towers on the south side of the opera house also roughly match the one on the Humanities building, which Greenberg also designed.

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West Lot U-Turn
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Featured Posts
12/20/16 10:45am

Never Mind the Lawsuit; Montrose Management District Still Marking Its Territory

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Montrose, Proposed Developments, Signage, Signs
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Montrose Management District marker, W. Dallas at Montrose

Montrose Management District marker, W. Dallas at MontroseThe Montrose Management District reports that the first of its shiny new neighborhood marker signs went up over the weekend at Montrose Blvd. and Dallas St., despite the recent movement in the ongoing lawsuit between the organization and the group of property owners petitioning to dissolve it. The case, which was filed in 2012, is still open, though the judge recently filed a handful of findings and judgment documents stating that not all of the signatures that went into forming the district were valid, and that the agency must pay back the $6.5 million it’s collected since then. The district has said it has no plans to do that any time soon, and intends to keep on keepin’ on until any appeals wrap up, which could be years from now.

The signage is part of the sundry prettification projects the district has planned for the neighborhood, which include redoing the colored lighting on the bridges over US 59 — thanks to a funding assist from the city, TxDOT, and the Houston Galveston Area Council:

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Sightings on W. Dallas
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Featured Posts
12/19/16 12:45pm

Midway: H-E-B-Footed Midrise on Washington Ave. Will Be in ‘Buffalo Heights’

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Washington Ave, Washington Corridor
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Rendering of Buffalo Heights Mixed Use Phase I, at Washington Ave. at Waugh Dr.

H-E-B preliminary plans for Washington Ave. at Heights Blvd.The complex containing Midway’s planned H-E-B-and-midrise at the southeast corner of Heights Blvd. and Washington Ave. won’t be named Northbank Buffalo Bayou after all, Nancy Sarnoff reports this week — it’ll be called Buffalo Heights. Above is Ziegler Cooper’s rendering of the proposed structure, which would take up the northwest corner of the old Archstone Memorial Heights apartments property (which was bought in 2014 by the current owners). That development previously gave its moniker to the surrounding neighborhood; it remains to be seen if this latest rebranding attempt will stick.

The new midrise would sit about half a mile south of the official southernmost edge of the Houston Heights (as drawn for voting in last month’s local-option Heights moistening election), and about half a mile north of Buffalo Bayou (though only a quarter mile from the Buffalo Wild Wings a few blocks west down Washington Ave). The new design shows off 5 stories of apartments (tallying up as 232 units) on top of the 2-story H-E-B, with about 37,000 sq. ft. of office space and a couple of other retail spots in the mix.

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First of Its Name in Memorial Heights
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Downtown
12/16/16 1:45pm

How This Weekend’s Music and Art Installations Will Fit Into the Old Barbara Jordan Post Office Downtown

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Post HTX Day for Night Layout
Former Barbara Jordan Post Office, 401 Franklin St., Downtown, Houston, 77002Here’s the site plan from the folks running the Day for Night festival, showing how the art installations and music stages will be laid out in the decommissioned post office at 401 Franklin St. this weekend. The Downtown building was sold last year to Lovett Commercial, which will be redeveloping the building over the next 8-ish years into a mixed-use complex called Post HTX. The circle sketched onto the gray-shaded area marked above as The Courtyard appears to match up with the circular garden feature visible in this aerial shot (looking northwest across Franklin St.) — here’s a closer view:

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Post-Post Office Downtown
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Featured Posts
12/16/16 11:30am

City OKs Floodable Outdoor Concert Venue in Willow Waterhole Detention Basin

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Westbury
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Levitt Pavilion Rendering
The city signed off this week on the plan to put an outdoor concert and performance venue into one of the Willow Waterhole Bayou detention basins along S. Post Oak Dr., north of the intersection with S. Main St. Specifically, the project is planned  alongside the basin just north of Gasmer Rd., west across S. Post Oak from that area previously wrapped in barbed wire to reserve it as habitat for endangered Texas prairiedawn. Rebecca Elliot writes that the stage will be paid for by the California-based Levitt Foundation, which has performance spaces geared toward public concerts and events in 6 cities around the country (and more in the works). The Houston venue will have to host at least 25 public events per year, and the city will be on the hook for up to $1 million in repairs during its first 15 years of operation.

Like some of the city’s other basin-bottom park infrastructure, the structure will be designed to flood on occasion: the rendering above shows the structure largely elevated on stilts, with the basin’s smaller permanent retention pond reflecting fireworks behind it. The structure should be somewhat hurricane-resistant, too — at least  according to an information packet dating back to 2012. That packet also included a drawing of the potential placement for the stage, along with some landscaping and parking lot layout:

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Staging in Westbury
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Featured Posts
12/15/16 4:45pm

Pool-Nostalgic Bird’s Barbershop All Set Up in Former Sausage-and-Laundering Strip on E. 20th

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Houston Heights, Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Retail
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Bird Barbershop, 420 E. 20th St., Houston Heights, Houston, 77008

Remodel of Heights Plaza, 420 E. 20th St., Heights, Houston, 77008Austin-based Shiner-wielding Bird’s Barbershop opened up its first Houston location last week in the remodeled 1955 retail strip at 420 E. 20th St., on the end of the building formerly home to J & R Boudin and Frenchy’s Sausage Co. The bubblegum pink parking stripes were joined by the spots above over the summer, as well as the circular window now floating in the middle of a wall where the facade’s westernmost door used to be.

A rep from the company says the Houston store was designed with community swimming pools in mind, which explains the interior tile scheme and watery motifs:

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420 in the Heights
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