In 2007, Houston’s city council sold a block of Bolsover St. in the Rice Village to the developers of Randall Davis’s Sonoma project so that it could be used as a private drive and restaurant plaza linking two phases of the development. Davis and Lamesa Properties did manage to demolish the neighboring buildings, but Sonoma was never built. Now, the Hanover Company is saying it’s ready to build portions of a 6-story mixed-use building directly on top of part of that street. Plans for the new project, called Hanover at Rice Village, show a large plaza with restaurant seating on the eastern portion of what used to be Bolsover, facing Morningside. But the west half of the block is slated for retail space, apartments, and a private courtyard for residents:
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Two restaurant spaces totaling just under 13,000 sq. ft. line the former Bolsover space along Morningside, which widens into an 18,000-sq.-ft. courtyard labeled “public” in the plans. The restaurants will have outdoor dining space in that courtyard and along the Morningside sidewalk.
The only other ground-floor retail space in the 4.5-acre development is 10,000 ft. of space for shops in 3 separate units facing Kelvin, to the west:
According to the leasing agents, the parking garage will have 150 parking spaces for the retail tenants, and another 40 street-level spaces for anybody. The plans show about 17 angled head-in spaces along Kelvin and Morningside. Also: They’re showing a dedicated valet lane in the retail garage entrance from Morningside. The company expects to begin construction this summer.
- Rice Village Retail (The Retail Shops at Hanover Rice Village) [WPW Realty Advisors]
- Previously on Swamplot: A Plaza View for the Rice Village: Hanover Plans Smaller Development in Place of Sonoma Screwup, Sonoma: Bolsover Bulldozer, Council Bowls Over, So No More Street
Images: The Hanover Company and Wallace Garcia Wilson Architects
Hanover must be German for “no gargoyles”. Sad.
Wait, that little bite out of the corner:
Does that mean the building there is staying?
If so, that would be a kinda cool little architectural detail
You give ’em an inch, they take your arm off.
I was driving by that area after checking out the new 24 hour fitness and was thinking it would be great if that mixed use/residential project got going again. The Rice Village has alot in the area within just a walking distance. How great would it be to live in an apartment complex in that area! All it needs is a grocery store just right there in the village.
There used to be several grocery stores in the Village…
Ah, the good ol’ days of going to Weingarten’s and pulling right into a parking spot by the front door.
“There used to be several grocery stores in the Village…”
“Ah, the good ol’ days of going to Weingarten’s and pulling right into a parking spot by the front door.”
I remember going to see a friend DJ at a club that was in an old grocery store in Rice Village. I thought it was an old Krogers but it must have been the Weingartens mentioned. It was where the Village Arcade is now i think.
Weingarten was on University approximately where The Gap is now. That whole block. Eckerd Drugs was a little farther east, next to the Village Theatre. Ed Nirken’s Men and Boy’s clothing store and World Toy and Gift were on the other side of the Village, at the corner of Morningside. There was a porn theatre where Cafe Chino is now and a country bar that later became a reggae bar on Rice Blvd. Rice Food Markets was at Rice and Morningside, and Hungry’s used to be a Dairy Queen. I never had trouble parking and the whole area just seemed to take itself a lot less seriously. I don’t think there was ever a Kroger’s in the Village; if there was it was before my time. Office Depot on Kirby at Richmond used to be a Kroger, and there used to be one at Braeswood and Kirby.
150 spot garage + 40 street parking spaces DOES get the development to code, but will be the standard nightmare that is Rice Village. It’s a positive project, though, and the future of that area.
If you want to see Houston in 10 years, take a weekend trip to Dallas. If you want to see it in 20 years, Atlanta. 30 years, Miami. Institutional developers like Hanover are just now starting to not shy away from Houston and its unregulated dirt.
Completely with precedent: I used to take Amherst until it dead ended into the Gingerman. Now there’s an “arcade” in the way. Things change; I’m old.
If you want to see Houston in 10 years, take a weekend trip to Dallas. If you want to see it in 20 years, Atlanta. 30 years, Miami.
Are you saying there will be a drought followed by a mini-ice age followed by the melting of the icecaps making Houston coastal?
Because I believe that more than us replicating any of those cities.
As a nearby homeowner, I suppose this could be far worse, so….meh…
Hopefully, apt. leases are $2/sf and tenants avoid it in droves. (ha)
BTW, marmer, don’t forget the old 2-story Craig’s Department Store, which (I guess) is now is “Urban Worthlessness”…
Yeah, the good old days. We did have a Rice grocery store in the Village not too long ago. Hey – maybe this new project will include a BANK. We sure need more of those. Let’s see – on Holcombe between Greenbriar and Kirby – I count 4. Now new bank going in where they tore down Bike Barn. Good Times.
They build more bank branches to encourage people to use those in-branch services that they can charge fees for. You know, like deposits and withdrawals where you might actually have to talk to a person…
I LOVED that old Craigs! My grandmother used to take me shopping there. It was so midcentury, all that cool granite and the steel staircase bannister and balcony railing. Could not believe how Urban Outfitters utterly ruined that space.
I do remember Craig’s, barely. Last time I went into Urban Outfitters, which I admit was shortly after it opened, I thought the staircase was still there. There’s a similar one in Half Price Books, which also used to be a department store.
I am in my mid fifties and have lived in the village area all my life. Does anybody remember that the site of this new development used to have a grocery store (Jamail’s?) that became a Post Office that became Nit Noi. Or, even more obscure, Mading’s drug store on the corner of Rice and Morningside?
These people are ANIMALS.
My grandma worked upstairs at Craig’s into her eighties – and loved it!
…then she walked home around the corner to Shakespeare St.
A commuter!
Re: comments
You can imagine my relief when that messy construction @ Kirby/Holcombe evolved into a:
Well, you know.
Cyclone Anayas is a welcome addition to the development.
who was your Grandmother, I worked at the Craig’s Dept store part time in the 80’s. I worked in the lingerie Dept