River Oaks

Watercolor of Proposed River Oaks District Mixed Use Development Planned for Westheimer by OliverMcMillan

With new bold, rich watercolor renderings now posted to its website, OliverMcMillan shows its mixed-use proposal for Westheimer is serious. The River Oaks District won’t be in River Oaks exactly, but it would mark a serious upgrade for this portion of Westheimer just inside the Loop, on a portion of the site of the Westcreek Apartments.

What’s planned here: 300,000 square feet of retail space, 300 fancy apartments, 250,000 square feet of office space, plus two hotels — rumored to be a W and a Le Meridien. The W Hotel will house 150 condos on its top floors.

After the jump: those shiny watercolors, plus plans and an aerial view!

77027, Apartments, Commercial Real Estate, Condos, Highrises, Hotels, Mixed Use, New Construction, Office Space, Proposed Developments, Retail, River Oaks, River Oaks District, Shopping Centers, Westheimer

01/11/08 8:33am

In River Oaks, This Sort of Thing Is Called Tall Timber

Demolitions, Home Design, Land Sales, River Oaks

Entrance Patio, 3840 Willowick Rd., River Oaks, Houston

A reader writes in to report that a house discussed recently on Swamplot had also been featured in Architectural Digest last October. And so it had! But really, they called it “Trapezoidal Transcendence”?? Whatever. Swamplot had the guts to call it what it really was: A River Oaks teardown.

Oh, well — there’s no accounting for taste. Unless, of course, you consider demolition a form of judgment:

By the way, that amazing modern house in the Tall Timbers section of River Oaks is definitely toast.

In this case, apparently, the decision of that judge was final.

River Oaks Land Rush: $2+ Million Memorial Park and Bayou Frontage with Modern Obstacle [Swamplot]
Estates for Sale [Architectural Digest]

77019, Buying and Selling, Demolitions, Home Design, Land Sales, Modern Design, River Oaks

12/13/07 11:59am

Staub Ranchsion Sale Not Going By the Book

Homes for Sale, Houston Architects, Land Prices, River Oaks

3740 Willowick Rd., River Oaks, Home by John Staub

How’s that River Oaks “you loved the book, now try the home” marketing tie-in going?

Well, Stephen Fox’s volume on The Country Houses of John F. Staub is currently ranked #10,535 on Amazon.com, which probably isn’t so bad for a book about a dead architect. It is heavily discounted, but it’s collected several favorable reviews online.

The reviews aren’t looking quite as good for the Staub ranch-mansion at 3740 Willowick: The asking price was dropped earlier this month from $7,495,000 to $6,950,000. For a 2.3-acre River Oaks lot with Buffalo Bayou frontage, that’s a healthy step closer to . . . yes, land value. And looky at all the excitement just down the street!

3740 Willowick Rd. [HAR]
The Country Houses of John F. Staub [Amazon.com]
Great Moments in Houston Home Marketing: The John Staub Tie-In [Swamplot]
River Oaks Land Rush: $2+ Million Memorial Park and Bayou Frontage with Modern Obstacle [Swamplot]

77019, Books, Buffalo Bayou, Buying and Selling, Homes for Sale, John Staub, Land Prices, Ranch-Houses, Real Estate Marketing, River Oaks

12/13/07 10:10am

River Oaks Land Rush: $2+ Million Memorial Park and Bayou Frontage with Modern Obstacle

Demolitions, Development Strategy, Land Prices, Land Sales, River Oaks

3840 Willowick Rd., River Oaks, Houston

Here’s the problem with these sleek houses on full-acre lots in River Oaks: They’re selling for too damn cheap! The gorgeous land at the southern boundary of Memorial Park fronting Buffalo Bayou at 3840 Willowick — hogged by this eighties-modern home designed by New York architects Stonehill and Taylor — got swept up for between $45 and $57 a square foot at the end of August.

At that price, wouldn’t your head be spinning with the themed-towering-mansion possibilities? Bring on the demo and stucco crews!

Well, the stucco and foam cornice pieces will probably take a while, but the big machines with the giant claws are on their way, according to this morning’s demolition report.

Photos, plans, and details of the house-that-got-in-the-way — including some fine examples of how to distract from a River Oaks land sale — after the jump:

77019, Buffalo Bayou, Buying and Selling, Demolitions, Development Strategy, Home Design, Land Prices, Land Sales, Memorial-Park, Modern Design, River Oaks

11/07/07 5:31pm

Great Moments in Houston Home Marketing: The John Staub Tie-In

Home Design, Homes for Sale, Houston Architects, Real Estate Marketing, River Oaks

3740 Willowick Dr. in River Oaks by Architect John Staub

A 1955 River Oaks “country house” designed by John Staub appears on MLS just days before architectural historian Stephen Fox’s book on the Houston architect appears in bookstores. Mere coincidence? Or brilliant upper-end home-marketing technique?

There’s a slight price difference between the two: The Country Houses of John F. Staub lists for $75, though Amazon.com whacks 37 percent off of that. No telling if the sellers will accept a similar discount off the $7.495 million asking price of 3740 Willowick.

The house overlooks Buffalo Bayou and features four fireplaces, three bedrooms, and six full and one half baths — all in a single story. Yes, it looks like some ranch-house flavor got mixed in here. There’s a garden loggia and lots of trees, plus a three-car attached garage. It’s a 5,532-square-foot home on a quarter-acre lot.

The book is 408 pages long and comes in hardcover. It features photographs by Richard Cheek, and will take up just three-quarters of a square foot on your coffee table.

After the jump: the not-so-ranchy interiors.

Of the house.

77019, Books, Buffalo Bayou, Buying and Selling, Home Design, Homes for Sale, Houston Architects, Interiors, John Staub, Ranch-Houses, Real Estate Marketing, River Oaks

Apartments

10/29/07 11:07am

The Belle Meade: Apartments Step Onto the Podium

Midtown, Museum District, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, River Oaks, Texas Medical Center, Townhomes

Belle Meade at River Oaks Elevation Drawing

Belle Meade at River Oaks on Westheimer

A permit was issued late last week. And so sitework begins for the 119-unit, 168,398-square-foot Belle Meade at River Oaks, on Westheimer between Ferndale and Sackett, developed by Grayco Partners:

The project is a 6-story epicore (light steel) construction on top of a 2-story podium garage. The boutique building will resemble the look of turn of the century, old New York hotels in brick with cast stone details, while spacious interiors will include such amenities as hardwood floors, 10-foot ceilings, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances and individual wine chillers. Community amenities will include conditioned interior corridors, heated pool, fitness facility, business center and a resident recreation room.

Grayco is also developing Museum Place, at Fannin and Oakdale in Midtown—a “contemporary design” also on a two-story podium. And Braeswood Place, on North Braeswood just east of Stella Link: the more usual four-story stick apartments hugging a parking garage, but it’ll also include 21 townhouses. It’s meant to look like Rice. All three properties will be managed by Camden Property Trust.

Grayco is digging right in on apartments [Houston Chronicle]
Belle Meade at River Oaks [Grayco]

77004, 77025, Apartments, Midtown, Museum District, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Parking, River Oaks, Texas Medical Center, Townhomes

Homes for Sale

09/25/07 10:37am

Just Listed: Texas Modern Outside, Martha Washington Inside

Houston History, Interiors, River Oaks

3202 Huntingdon Place, River Oaks

Note: Story updated below.

A house in Houston can’t earn much more of a modern Texas pedigree than this: Designed in 1970 for Oveta Culp Hobby by quintessential Texas architect O’Neil Ford. Built by Brown & Root. Later, the home—until his death earlier this summer—of former Texas secretary of state, attorney general, chief justice, and 1978 Democratic gubernatorial candidate John Hill.

It’s just been listed with Greenwood-King agent Colleen Sherlock: three stories, five to seven bedrooms, five full and two half-baths, 8275 square feet on a quarter-acre lot in River Oaks. Asking only $2,395,000.

From O’Neil Ford, you’d expect a classic Texas modern design: clean brick lines with a sense of history, an easy flow between indoors and out. Until you get inside, where—it appears—an early-1960s interpretation of a New England colonial interior has somehow been grafted in.

Sound like a jarring contrast? Continue after the jump, and see for yourself.

77019, Architects, Homes for Sale, Houston History, Interiors, Modern Design, ONeil-Ford, River Oaks

Apartments

08/10/07 7:29pm

River Oaks To Move West, Add Hotels, Apartments, Offices, and Shopping

Commercial Real Estate, Condos, Highland Village, Highrises, Malls, Mixed Use, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Retail, River Oaks, Shopping Centers

Street Perspective of Proposed River Oaks District Development by Oliver McMillan

Aerial View of Proposed River Oaks District Mixed Use Development The Houston Business Journal gives more details on the River Oaks District, a 15-acre, $600 million mixed-use development proposed for Westheimer just inside the loop, on the site of the Westcreek Apartments, between Highland Village and the Galleria. It’s hard to imagine River Oaks moving further west than that. Once you get to the other side of the loop of course, you might as well call yourself Tanglewood.

Two luxury hotels are on tap. The five-star properties will have a total of 500 guest rooms, and 150 condominiums for sale at the top of one tower.

Another building will hold 300 upscale apartment units. A 10-story office building with 250,000 square feet of space also is part of the mix. And since the Galleria is synonymous with shopping, the developer plans 350,000 square feet of mostly ground-level retail space.

San Diego developer OliverMcMillan says groundbreaking is scheduled for a good year-and-a-half from now. So there’s plenty of time for this project to morph into a more typical Houston-style mixed-use project: maybe a stylish Sam’s Club next to some shiny new apartments?

After the jump, plans and more flashy drawings!

77027, Apartments, Commercial Real Estate, Condos, Galleria, Highland Village, Highrises, Hotels, Mixed Use, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Retail, River Oaks, River Oaks District, Shopping Centers, Westheimer

Commercial Real Estate

07/27/07 2:16pm

My Tower Will Be 500 Feet Taller Than Your Tower

Development Strategy, Highrises, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, River Oaks

Norfolk Tower One of the biggest office landlords in Texas has announced that he wants to build a very tall tower in either Chicago, Los Angeles, or Houston. Zaya Younan, who’s been in the real-estate business for five years, wants to show the world how tall a building he can erect. How tall is that?

. . . he doesn’t want a building that will barely rate a mention in the history books, a delicate titleholder surpassed in some Asian capital before its paint dries. “I want it to be the tallest for as long as I am alive,” Younan told the Sun-Times. . . .

The chairman of Younan Properties Inc. said that to build something with a lengthy hold on the record, he’ll need about 500 feet of cushion between his building’s height and any probable competitors.

By today’s standards, that means going up about 3,000 feet. It’s Sears Tower times two. It could cost $4 billion.

The Chicago Sun-Times article declares that the wealthy and powerful L.A. developer “is not crazy.” Younan Properties owns and manages the Norfolk “Tower” (it looks maybe ten stories tall; see the photo above) at Greenbriar and 59 in Houston. The company is the top office landlord in Dallas and the third-largest owner of Class A office space in Texas.

Houston airspace height restrictions blah blah blah downtown blocks too small a base blah blah blah free publicity in three cities blah blah blah.

Towering ambition [Chicago Sun-Times, via HAIF]
Younan Properties

77019, Development Strategy, Highrises, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, River Oaks, Skyscrapers

Apartments

05/21/07 9:57am

West Ave: Shiny, Happy People Holding Shopping Bags

Mixed Use, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Proposed Developments, River Oaks, Upper Kirby

View Down West Ave

The teaser website for the apartments-and-retail complex slated for that large, recently scraped site at the southwest corner of Kirby and Westheimer is up! What will you find there? For starters, a trance soundtrack you’ll have a tough time figuring out how to turn off, plus slick rendered views and a whizzy video of a dark and urban-looking streetscape where pedestrians wield shopping bags and hover precariously on balconies.

This is the former site of the River Oaks Tennis Center. The development is named West Ave, and to prove it they’re putting in a new street by the same name just west of Kirby, extending from Kipling to Westheimer. Of course the big news is the two floors of retail space facing Kirby, West Avenue, and Westheimer. On top of that: five stories of apartments, managed by Gables Residential. The parking garage is tucked in back.

After the jump: The plan and more images.

77098, Apartments, Mixed Use, New Construction, New-Streets, Proposed Developments, Retail, River Oaks, Shopping, Upper Kirby, West Ave

Demolitions

04/26/07 12:28pm

How To Demolish Houston Landmarks

Historic Preservation, River Oaks, Shopping Centers

River Oaks Theater

Disposing of older buildings used to be so simple. It’s tougher now, but it’s not impossible. You’ll just need to use some new techniques. If the buildings you want to demolish have a high enough profile, you’ll also need a good PR consultant who can help you with strategy.

For a while, it looked like Weingarten Realty might have some trouble tearing down its historic River Oaks Shopping Center, River Oaks Theater, and Alabama Bookstop (which used to be the Alabama Theater—back in the day when people watched movies instead of reading so much). When rumors first began to circulate, there was the big hullabaloo about the River Oaks Theater, and all those online petitions.

But since then, not so much. Weingarten clearly has its winning gameplan mapped out. How did they do it? How do you tear down an immensely popular older building in Houston today, and do it right?

The technique you need involves outrage bait. What’s that? Read on, after the jump!