The new brick building across from the Cavalcade station on Fulton St. that went up next to the former Dairy Queen corner spot known as Dairy Land is meant for Dairy Land, new lettering attached to the recently completed replacement structure attests. The signage went up shortly after the old building at 310 Cavalcade St. (pictured below) was demolished last week.
“What’s up with Julia’s?” writes the Swamplot reader who got a Main St. train to slow down enough to snap the photo of the unlit Midtown restaurant above. “It’s been dark and closed for weeks now. With all the new development and foot traffic from the new apartments across the street and new restaurants/bars in the area, everyone’s wondering: Is something new in the works for this premier midtown corner?” The answer is yes: A “new concept” for the restaurant space is being developed. In the meantime, Julia’s Bistro is closed for lunch and dinner, but available for private parties.
Jaws have been dropping along North Blvd. at the intersection of Kirby Dr. at the sight of a prominently placed inscription that now greets drive-thru customers of the Wendy’s at 5003 Kirby Dr. Is this just one of those obliviously coincidental following-corporate-guidelines things, or is the management of this Wendy’s going out of its way to draw attention to the under-cover-of-night street-tree massacre it orchestrated late last year to clear away 6 oaks on the corner and that cost the franchise owners a well-publicized $300,000 settlement from the city’s legal department? Or is the assembly of words attached directly to the brick wall, which honors “SERVICE THAT DOESN’T CUT CORNERS,” meant to apologize for the hired landscaping crew’s actions — which y’know, really did cut a corner — and emphasize that the hardworking burger-makers inside are trying to do something . . . different?
In full, the signage reads, “QUALITY SERVICE THAT DOESN’T CUT CORNERS IS OUR RECIPE,” though the part about corner-cutting service in the middle is clearly meant as an add-on to the fast-food chain’s more famous “Quality is our recipe” tagline. For those of you who haven’t been following the saga closely enough to appreciate the . . . humor? chutzpah? contrition? obliviousness? involved here, Â here’s the backstory:
The former Hollywood Vietnamese and Chinese restaurant building just north of Westheimer at 2409 Montrose Blvd. has been turned into a dog adoption facility run by K-9 Angels Rescue. The restaurant closed down in that space last Thanksgiving after developer Jonathan Farb purchased the property and the surrounding parking lots for a new apartment complex on the block, which is bounded by Hyde Park Blvd., Grant St., and Fairview. This isn’t the first last-occupant stint for the K-9 Angels; the nonprofit organization had been operating out of the former Cat Clinic building at 2100 W. Alabama St., before that building was torn down for a new CVS siding up to S. Shepherd Dr. one block south of the Alabama Theater Shopping Center.
Farb donated use of the space to the K-9 Angels temporarily — until he starts construction on the midrise, currently planned for “late spring or early summer.”
The last date to order cheese enchiladas at Los Dos Amigos, the Mexican restaurant that’s stood at 5720 Washington Ave at the corner of Birdsall for the past 39 years, is February 28th. In early December, the longtime owners of an L-shaped group of parcels spanning the entire north side of the Washington Ave block between Birdsall and Malone — along with an adjoining “L” around the corner facing Birdsall (see map above) — sold the whole thing to a developer out of Dallas operating under the name of a partnership calling itself OSF Washington. Among the other entities linked to the buyers: Vintala Partners, which has developed apartments in the past.
Also on the block and going away: the Premo’s Grocery building at 5702 Washington. The entire site, including both buildings and parking lots, measures 26,675 sq. ft.
The latest in a stream of coffee shops to grace the bungalow at 1030 Heights Blvd. will open next month, the owner of the new establishment reports. Equilibrium Social House will serve coffee, teas, and baked goods in a building that’s been repainted (see above) since the departure of Boulevard Coffee. Inside, there’s a new counter and serving area and new furniture. New sliding doors will allow some interior spaces to be closed off for private meetings. The EQ patio will be open to both humans and dogs.
Photo: Equilibrium Social House
A regular Kirby Dr. street-tree watcher sends in this pair of recent images showing the Wendy’s drive-thru at 5003 Kirby Dr. (at the far western end of oak-tree-bedecked North Blvd.), which reopened after renovations the week before Christmas, and its neighbor a few driveways down, the Burger King at 5115 Kirby Dr. (at the far western end of similarly shaded South Blvd). The photos show the aftermath of a series of chainsaw incidents that took place last year.
The daring but probably not death-inducing trimming of the lone surviving Kirby Dr. street tree in front of Wendy’s (shown at top) took place after the franchise’s owner, Ali Dhanani of Haza Foods, paid the city a $300,000 settlement for the nighttime removal of 6 other oaks on city property surrounding the restaurant shortly before Halloween. A report in November indicated that the city’s legal team was investigating the more aggressive paring of oak limbs in front of the neighboring Burger King, as well as another Burger King owned by Houston Foods, the second-largest Burger King franchisee in the country, which is run by Dhanani’s brother, Shoukat Dhanani.
Photos: Swamplot inbox
The last day of business for the original Ruggles Green location, in the Persona Day Spa shopping center at 2311 West Alabama St. east of Kirby Dr. (above), was New Year’s Eve. But the restaurant claims it won’t be gone from the neighborhood for too long. A new Ruggles Green is scheduled to open up in the street-facing retail space on the ground floor of the Gables Upper Kirby apartments going up next door (portrayed above left), once construction on that project is finished. That’ll be this spring, a note on the Ruggles Green website promises. The new address, 2305 W. Alabama St., will be one door down from the former Mission Burrito, recently renamed Ãœberrito Mexican Grill to avoid tortilla torts.
Meanwhile, up in The Woodlands, a brand new Ruggles Green in the shopping center at 2501 Research Forest Dr. is scheduled to open any day now — “whenever the chairs arrive,” the company’s Facebook page declares. Here’s a pic of that standing-room-only (for now) location:
We’re still awaiting photos of the scene — both to confirm and to allow everyone to revel in the destruction — but a regular tipster informs Swamplot that the building backing up to Buffalo Bayou on the south side of I-10 near Voss Rd. that until mid-2009 housed the Las Alamedas Restaurant is being demolished. The back side of the building has been ripped open, the reader reports;, but as of a visit yesterday the front of the building remained intact.
Reader Sean McManus was on the spot for yesterday’s demolition proceedings at the southwest corner of W. Alabama St. and S. Shepherd Dr., where Roeder’s Pub, Ruchi’s taqueria, Fly High Little Bunny jewelry store and the River Oaks Dry Cleaners are being swept away in favor of a CVS pharmacy.
“As I was taking [the pictures], one of the deconstruction workers asked if he could help me,” McManus writes. “I told him that I was just taking a couple of quick photos. His response: ‘Pfft… Memories.’”
More hot demo porn after the jump:
Looks like that long-vacant, wheatpaste poster-festooned former service station and repair shop in the heart of the Houston Heights will finally be reincarnated. Eater Houston’s Jakeisha Wilmore is reporting that Morgan Weber and Ryan Pera, the team behind Revival Market and Coltivare, have snatched up the former Citgo at 1039 Yale St., an address less than a mile from both Coltivare and Revival. Exactly what Pera and Weber will be dishing out in lieu of unleaded and 10W-40 remains to be seen; a spokesman told Wilmore that the rumored restaurant’s concept is still secret.
Photo: Jakeisha Wilmore
You’re looking at Harris County’s very first Cherry Berry Self-Serve Frozen Yogurt Bar. It’s going in at 949 N. Shepherd Dr., into a Merchants Park shopping center storefront that most recently housed an AT&T Wireless shop.
Froyo’s arrival in Merchants Park caps 5 years of steady transformation among the tenants in the Kroger-anchored shopping center that sprawls more than 2 blocks south down N. Shepherd and N. Durham Dr. from W. 11th St.
Next up at 3704 Fannin, known to some as the old Evelyn Wilson Interiors building, The Vanderbilt Sports Lounge.
It’s a block or two from the bustling Ensemble MetroRail stop and the under-construction Mid Main mixed-use development.
Once complete, the Vanderbilt promises 55 teevees airing football, baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer, boxing, and UFC, an “upscale menu,” and a third-floor cocktail lounge with a panoramic view of the city.
The building is owned and being renovated by Cody Lutsch of Fat Properties Property, a frequent Swamplot commenter and until now, known more as a purchaser of aging Inner Loop apartment buildings.
Lutsch sent us a few pics of the Vanderbilt’s ongoing renovations, along with a few “before” shots:
“We went there the very last night they were open and ended up on the TV news,” remembers reader Laura Friedl Jones of the 24-hour Shipley Coffee Shop and Grill that stood for years at the corner of W. Gray St. and Dunlavy St., where the Office Max above squats today.
While you could pick up a dozen glazed there, the fare at this Shipley ranged far afield of the norm for the homegrown chain:
Here’s a look at Houston’s upcoming second location of the New Orleans-based PJ’s Coffee chain. The banner is up and workers are inside the new mini-strip mall at the Cottage Grove corner of Larkin St. and Durham Dr., just south of Yuppie Dog pet care, and just north of a taco truck-friendly parking lot and a Wendy’s, and just across the Katy Fwy. from looming competition in the form of a strip-mall Starbucks.
