Construction Materials

77098, Apartments, Construction Materials, Demolitions, Historic Preservation, Lancaster Place, Redevelopment, Wilshire Village

Comments

04/16/09 11:55pm

Comment of the Day: Houston Counter Culture

Construction Materials, Quicklink

No Comments

COMMENT OF THE DAY: HOUSTON COUNTER CULTURE “We, too, have formica counters â€” rather nice-looking, attractively textured and easy-to-care-for laminate â€” plus a useful bit of stainless steel around the sink. Past abodes have had concrete, little 1940â€™s hexagonal tiles, or 1960â€™s 4â€³ tiles in the kitchen. But, yes, Cathy, all this granite business has got me to thinking about the Next Big Countertop Thing. I predict that it will be Spanish moss. Cheap, renewable, non-toxic, pleasantly yielding under a cutting board, and doubling as garnish for everything from humble casseroles to stuffed breast of vealâ€¦whatâ€™s not to like?” [Miz Brooke Smith, commenting on Neighborhood Guessing Game: Panel Discussion]

Comments, Construction Materials, Countertops, Granite Countertops

Apartments

04/16/09 4:38pm

Okay, How About the Wilshire Village Apartments for Salvage?

Construction Materials, Demolitions, Lancaster Place, Redevelopment

6 Comments

The nonprofit Historic Houston Salvage Warehouse sure would like some of them nice materials that went into the Wilshire Village Apartments. But no dice:

“All efforts to contact owner have been a dead end,” founder Lynn Edmundson writes:

If anyone knows or can get in contact with the ownersâ€¦my crew could start immediately!!!

Hey, that would be great — because there’s apparently a Komatsu excavator hanging out in the parking lot on Dunlavy, looking for some action.

More from Edmundson:

77098, Apartments, Construction Materials, Demolitions, Lancaster Place, Redevelopment, Wilshire Village

04/07/09 2:21pm

Not Preston Hard Enough: A Shade Loose Downtown

Downtown, Hazards, Public Buildings

6 Comments

The brise-soleil modern Harris County Administration Building at 1001 Preston Downtown — across from a Metro Rail stop on Main St. — has been having a little problem holding it all together, reports the Chronicle‘s Liz Peterson. And it’ll take a little fixing:

Employees noticed the first bits of fallen concrete in February 2008, prompting the county to hire Walter P. Moore and Associates to evaluate the extent of the problem, said Mike Swain, the county’s deputy director of architecture.

The firm’s workers spent the next several months removing the most dangerous loose concrete and studying the rest of the 31-year-old building’s faÃ§ade, he said.

Their report urges the county to install protective scaffolding around the building’s perimeter as soon as possible. Doing that and removing the rest of the loose concrete is expected to cost about $175,000.

Repairing the concrete faÃ§ade is expected to cost at least $4.5 million, while waterproofing all the windows will eat up another $460,000.

Look out below… [Houston Politics]

Photo: Harris County Purchasing Agent

77002, Construction Materials, Downtown, Hazards, Public Buildings, Public Safety

Air Quality

03/24/09 9:24am

Chinese Drywall and the Smell Test

Construction Materials, Hazards, Quicklink

4 Comments

CHINESE DRYWALL AND THE SMELL TEST The first government report on Chinese drywall is out . . . sort of: “On Monday, Floridaâ€™s health department said preliminary tests show thereâ€™s no ‘specific’ health hazard associated with the sulfur-based gases coming from the drywall, but the agency is conducting additional tests. ‘Itâ€™s not that we are saying itâ€™s safe,’ Florida toxicologist David Krause told reporters on a conference call on Monday. ‘We are moving forward on a much more detailed in-depth’ study. The test results released by the state health department on Monday did make one, definitive conclusion: Chinese-made drywall contained strontium sulfide, a material thatâ€™s known to have the odor of hydrogen sulfide in moist air. The U.S-made drywall did not contain this material. The most common evidence of Chinese drywall problems is the corrosion of air conditional equipment, which is turning black and failing repeatedly. Homeowners have also complained about respiratory problems they believe are connected to the drywall.” [Developments]

Air Quality, Chinese Drywall, Construction Materials, Hazards

03/17/09 2:28pm

Reporting Live from the Westmoreland Stucco Renaissance

Midtown, Renovations, Westmoreland Historic District

4 Comments

A reader sends a couple photos of “what will soon no longer be a nice understated commercial building” at 315 W. Alabama, just south of the Westmoreland Historic District west of Midtown:

I watched the remodel work inside going on for a while and was a little shocked to see the brick facade receiving prep work to be refaced in stucco. You can see the nice bit of decorative garland in the process of being knocked off by the end of today.

77006, Construction Materials, Midtown, Renovations, Stucco, Westmoreland Historic District

Candlelight Forest

02/05/09 8:37am

Candlelight Forest Indoor Landscape

Construction Materials, Home Decor, Home Design, Homes for Sale, Landscape

5 Comments

“SPACIOUS LIVINGROOM WITH SKYLIGHT & FLOWERBED,” shouts the listing for this 1970s-era home on a cul-de-sac near White Oak Bayou in Candlelight Forest. And it’s no exaggeration. The Swamplot reader who alerted us to the property also expressed appreciation for its mauve carpet and mirrored Dining Room wall:

77088, Candlelight Forest, Construction Materials, Home Decor, Home Design, Homes for Sale, Landscape, Modern Design

Art

01/16/09 5:00pm

CLUI in Houston: Attack of the Pod People

Construction Materials, Landscape, University of Houston

6 Comments

What is it with these Landscape folks and their capsules? Last spring, L.A.’s sly Center for Land Use Interpretation began its residency in Houston by hauling an old trailer, dubbed the organization’s “field station,” to an old junkyard on the banks of the Houston Ship Channel. And now, a year later — the oil-industry spying mission almost complete — CLUI guru Matthew Coolidge and his henchpeople are capping their Houston romp with another demonstration of the delights of enclosed living.

That’s a Brucker Survival Capsule, painted bright red and decorated with a typically deadpan CLUI inscription, being installed outside the University of Houston’s Blaffer Art Gallery, where CLUI’s exhibit on the landscape practices of the Texas oil industry opens — tonight. If planting an offshore-oil-rig emergency escape vehicle on the front lawn of a university art gallery strikes you as slightly absurd, you’re only beginning to appreciate CLUI’s rare and dry sense of landscape humor.

77004, Art, Construction Materials, Landscape, UH

Brookesmith

01/14/09 11:19am

The Recycled Glass Driveway at the Cordell Shipping Container House

Construction Materials, Flooding, Green Design and Development

15 Comments

Next experiment at that Swamplot-Award-winning house built out of shipping containers on Cordell St. in Brookesmith? The unique driveway installed earlier this week. John Walker of Numen Development writes in with details:

It is composed of recycled crushed glass, with a resin binder, and achieves the consistency of caramel popcorn for lack of a better description, so it has voids that allow surface water to percolate through the paving and ultimately be absorbed into the underlying soil rather than running off into the storm drainage system. It is a triple threat: recycled material, reduces environmental impact of development, and it’s really cool!

Walker says Presto Geosystems, a division of Alcoa, installed the driveway as a pilot project for the Houston market.

This installation has been described by their consulting engineer as most likely the “first and last” residential project they will do in Houston as the product is expected to meet with huge commercial demand, especially for “landlocked” developments for whom expansion is limited by Harris County stormwater detention limitations.

Some views of the installation:

77009, Brookesmith, Construction Materials, Flooding, Green Design and Development, Paving, Recycled Materials, Shipping-Containers

12/31/08 11:41am

Seen on the Street: Holiday Theater

Fifth Ward, Meyerland

No Comments

Again with the fun pix from around town! First: What’s this little toy parking lot?

77020, 77076, 77096, Construction Materials, Fifth Ward, Meyerland, Movie-Theaters, Parking-Lots

12/04/08 5:05pm

$99K House Series: SoyBeam House

Fifth Ward, Green Design and Development, Home Design

1 Comment

Next up in our $99K House Competition review: An innovative entry from Nick Gillock and Emil Mertzel of Lookinglass Architecture + Design in L.A.:

This project for an affordable, sustainable and energy efficient new 1264 square-foot home combines some conventional home-building techniques – such as below-grade utilities, an insulated concrete floor slab, concrete curbs and framed wall assemblies with pre-engineered shear panels – with an entirely new building component known as the SoyBeamâ„¢.

77026, 99K House Competition, Construction Materials, Design Competitions, Fifth Ward, Green Design, Home Design

12/03/08 11:11am

$99K House Series: The Rippling House

Fifth Ward, Green Design and Development, Home Design

5 Comments

Today’s featured entry to the $99K House Competition comes from Luca Donner and Francesca Sorcinelli of Donner & Sorcinelli Architetti in Silea — near Venice, Italy. It’s called the “Rippling House.”

The idea was to give people a home that could be built cheaply, using simple technologies, suitable for self-construction, and where they can have optimal comfort. These are the issues our studio focuses on: everyday problems. We believe that a good project should not necessarily cost more. You can give convincing answers even with limited budgets, and this project is an example.

77026, 99K House Competition, Construction Materials, Design Competitions, Fifth Ward, Green Design, Home Design

12/01/08 3:55pm

$99K House Series: The Shell System

Fifth Ward, Green Design and Development, Home Design

1 Comment

Digsau, an architecture firm out of Philly, worked with Oldcastle Precast to come up with this $99K house entry, which uses some concrete technology more commonly encountered in Houston area civil structures:

A concrete module serves as the building block for the system, and its combination with other modules allows the structure to respond to specificities of climate, site, and individual preference. The system thus proves highly adaptable as an infill structure on vacant properties in an urban context and allowing for a diversity of exterior space in new developments.

77026, 99K House Competition, Construction Materials, Design Competitions, Fifth Ward, Green Design, Home Design, Precast Concrete

11/06/08 2:31pm

Used Campaign Signs: For the Birds

Critters, Green Design and Development

3 Comments

Staircase Treads Covered with Used Election Campaign Signs

What do you do with campaign signs after the election is over? Environmental-news blog Grist links to a brief Swamplot story from earlier this year that pointed to one solution to the problem. The suggestion came from abc13 reporter Miya Shay, who snapped the photo above, showing used signs used as temporary stair-tread protectors in a house under construction. “Let’s face it,” Grist writer Katharine Wroth adds, “it’s fun to kick politicians in the teeth.”

Wroth has several more suggestions for reusing leftover signs, including employing the corrugated plastic ones as a siding material. But another recommendation is more striking: You can send Corex or Coroplast signs to a bird-of-prey conservancy organization in San Antonio called Last Chance Forever. Why does LCF want them?

Construction Materials, Critters, Green Design, Recycling

10/24/08 11:27am

Neighborhood Guessing Game Over: Pecky

Home Decor, Interiors, Neighborhood Guessing Game, River Oaks

3 Comments

Neighborhood Guessing Game 29: Bedroom

The winner of this week’s contest . . . didn’t even bother with a guess!

The rest of you guessed Westbury, “off Rayford,” the Woodlands, Memorial, Memorial Drive, Hilshire Village (twice), Braeswood, Old Braeswood, Braes Heights, Piney Point, Meyerland, Riverside Terrace (twice), Glenbrook Valley, West University, Bellaire, Afton Oaks, Spring Branch (three times), Tanglewood (three times), Memorial Bend, Spring Valley, T.C. Jester just outside the Loop, Richmond inside the Loop west of Weslayan, or off Woodway near Sage.

Nobody actually guessed River Oaks, but Richard mentioned it:

. . . I also like this house and totally agree that it took some $$$ to create the hallucinogenic patterned nightmare. Without the kitchen it actually looks like a Howard Barnstone house or even the house that Philip Johnson designed for Dominique de Menil in River Oaks.

So he is the winner!

An honorable mention goes to paneling expert Robert, who obviously knows his woods:

The paneling in the den is a pecky cypress commonly referred to as â€œwormwood.â€ Expensive in itâ€™s day, too expensive for Westbury. The house appears to large with too many custom features like that to be a basic tract house. The pattern festival was popular back in the 70â€™s and cost a lot to create that abomination in decorating.

In what part of River Oaks has this home been hiding?