- 4000 Willowick Rd. [HAR]
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The Houston Area League of PC Users will be moving out of its ghost town of a 6,665 sq. ft. headquarters space in the sleepy 2-story office building at 4543 Post Oak Place Dr. a bit later than its originally announced deadline of the end of 2013. But HAL-PC isn’t leaving (as it declared last year) to find some more suitable space with more attractive rents and fewer parking problems, and so the building can work its way to a new identity as an assembly of medical clinics; it’s leaving on account of the organization is shutting down entirely. By a vote of the board of directors earlier this week, HAL-PC has chosen to disband.
User Group Deprecated
A FOILED BIT OF ART THIEVERY DOWNTOWN 
Two men in casual business attire attempted to walk out of a basement service door of the JPMorgan Chase Tower at 600 Travis St. after midnight last night with the beach-scene painting pictured at right, which had been hanging in one of the building’s common areas. Police recovered the painting from a stairwell near the Alonti Cafe, where the pair appeared to have dropped it after hearing sirens. Suspects were arrested as they walked casually along the sidewalk in front of the building, and charged with felony theft. [News92FM] Photo: KHOU
Chiming in with this morning’s Demo Report, which more formally announces the departure of a couple of old single-story buildings at 607 and 609 Chenevert St., reader Jack Miller sends in this photo of the scene yesterday a couple blocks north of the George R. Brown Convention Center and immediately south of Minute Maid Park. At the far left, an excavator is seen assuring that the former Houston Professional Musicians’ Association and Houston Precious Metals buildings from 1949 will indeed get out of the way in time for the Nau Center for Texas Cultural Heritage to be built on the site.
Is this yet another story of older Houston buildings making way for the new? Maybe, but at a larger scale, it’s partly the reverse: Two houses from 1904 and 1905 were moved onto a portion of Avenida de Las Americas glommed onto the site 3 years ago, on a spot across Texas Ave. from the ball park (behind and to the left of the camera). And the photo below includes a glimpse (on the far right) of the 1919 Southern Pacific 982 steam engine scooted out of the houses’ way and settled in along the light-rail line on Capitol St.:
Centering Our Cultural Heritage
- A Map of the 14 Projects Currently Under Construction and 39 Planned in Downtown [Prime Property]
- Noteworthy Projects Houston’s Top Architecture Firms Will Work on in the Next Year [Houston Business Journal]
- A Tour of Al Ross Luxury Homes ‘Wow Factors’ in a 6,315-SF Spanish Revival on Inwood Dr. [Houston Business Journal]
- Lessees of Rockefeller Hall on Wash Ave Moving Their Event Business To a New, Undisclosed Location [Houston Business Journal]
- Jarro Cafe in Spring Branch Closed Due to ‘Poor Infrastructure of the Building’; Truck Still in Business [Houstonia]
- Texas Transportation Commission Adds $25M To Uptown Transit Plan To Build Dedicated Bus Lane Along Loop 610 [The Highwayman]
- In ‘Startling Turnaround’ from Demographic Trends, Harris County Added 25K White Residents in Past 3 Years [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- National Report Identifies Houston-Galveston-Area Beaches with Polluted Water Samples [Houston Chronicle]
- A Walking Tour of Rice University, Starting with the Cheapest Place To Park on Campus [OffCite]
- Percentage of 25-29 Year Olds Living at Home Increased from 15% to 20% in Past Decade, Finds Harvard Study [Houston Chronicle ($)]
Photo of Highland Village: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
KATY GARAGE APARTMENT FLOOR COLLAPSE ENDS CELEBRATION, INJURES DOZENS OF GUESTS 
Dozens of people were sent to area hospitals after the floor of an upstairs garage apartment collapsed this afternoon during a private religious ceremony attended by more than 100 people. The structure — in the back yard of a home on Park Mill Dr. near Park Brush Ln. just west of Memorial Parkway Junior High School in Katy — is still standing, but photos (at right) show the walls slightly bowed in spots and its siding popped out around the perimeter of what was once the second floor. According to reports, the apartment floor bowed, then fell onto the garage below. Three persons were reported to be in critical condition. [KHOU; Houston Chronicle] Photo: KHOU
Is it any wonder that this custom studio-home of a fine arts photography gallery owner is camera ready? From curbside, it comes with a limelight finish. Rice architecture prof Carlos Jiménez, who’s designed art museums, homes, and warehouses alike, incorporated ingredients of each in this 2011 project. A week ago, the Riverside Terrace property went up for sale with a $650,000 asking price.
The sloping roof accommodates a partial second story, as well as lofty living and a large, column-free exhibition space at ground level:
Flash Finish
COMMENT OF THE DAY: HE WENT THERE 
“Careful where you place those toilets during construction. I uprooted one and moved it to temporary storage in the corner of a back room. At Christmas, my visiting father-in-law came up to me and said, ‘Hey — that toilet doesn’t flush — something’s wrong with it.’†[Superdave, commenting on Wallis Home Listing Photo of the Day: Watch Your Back] Illustration: Lulu
The northeast corner of Westheimer and Fondren, where until recently a Landry’s Seafood restaurant and a Prosperity Bank building stood, is the scene for this remarkable series of photos sent to Swamplot by reader Roy Cormier, showing the demolition in progress earlier this month. Above, an excavator nibbles away at the remaining urban oasis at the end of the parking lot. Below, we find the drive-up ATM at the end of civilization:
Crest, not Complete
The reader who sent Swamplot a steaming hot tip late last summer — Pink’s Pizza is coming to Wash Ave! — brings us up-to-date on construction progress at the sidestreet-facing strip center at 1009 Moy St. (above) a full 10 months later: There’s been none. “Other than the signage on the building and on Washington at the front of the shopping center, there’s been no work done in months,” reads our report. One door over from the Pink’s spot in Suite B (pictured at right), however, a sign is up for Below Parallel, a new retail outlet where customers will be able to equip themselves to work off their pizza before even eating it. The banner promises shoes, supplements, and apparel —- and an opening date next month. “Strange location,” declares our tipster — the shuttered Blue Moose Lodge is around the corner — “but I guess the four Crossfit gyms in a mile radius can shop there.”
- All the Gear You Need, Today [Below Parallel]
- Previously on Swamplot: Pink’s Pizza Moving Into West End Strip Center
Photos: Swamplot inbox
West End Cycles
- Toll Brothers To Begin Construction in August of Unnamed Luxury Community near The Woodlands [Houston Business Journal]
- $1.3M Boardwalk, 55K-Sq.-Ft. Convention Center Planned for Land Across from the Katy Mills Mall [Community Impact Newspaper]
- The Challenges Behind Turning Houston’s First Commercial Highrise into a JW Marriott [Houston Business Journal]
- Mod Pizza Chain To Open First Houston-Area Location in September in Vintage Marketplace, Up To 10 To Follow by End of 2015 [Houston Business Journal]
- Chefs Adam Dorris, Plinio Sandalio To Open Pax Americana in Former Thai Sticks Space in Montrose [Food Chronicles; previously on Swamplot]
- Bistro Menil on Track To Open in Early September [Eater Houston; previously on Swamplot]
- Metro Chooses Omega Engineers To Design East End Overpass [Houston Public Media]
- A Driving Tour of Kinney Morrow Architecture’s Renovation, Preservation Projects in Houston [OffCite]
- Upwards of a Million Bees Removed from Vacant Almeda Plaza Civic Club Clubhouse [Click2Houston]
- Phil Collins To Donate His Massive Collection of Artifacts from the Texas Revolution to the Alamo [San Antonio Express-News]
Photo of the Cockrell Butterfly Center: elnina via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
Why is Houston architect Karen Lantz putting up for sale the 1963 split-level cabin near Lake Travis she painstakingly brought back to life and renovated? To free up funds for more on-her-own projects for her family, she tells Swamplot. Of course, a real-estate listing of an architect’s own home can do double marketing duty: There’s always the chance someone might see your home and want to buy it! But there’s also a chance someone might see your home and want something kind of like it, but somewhere else. . . .
So Lantz went a little wild with the online show-and-tell, repurposing many of the images she had had taken and drawn of the property when she submitted it for professional recognition (both Lantz and the home won awards from the AIA last year) into a fancy listing website that pokes into all sorts of different sections of the half-acre lot, pointing out the “drainage swale,” “bamboo grove,” “firefly grotto” (with video of the bugs in action), “firefly patio,” BBQ patio, “arroyo,” swings (above left), and — oh, yeah, the house too:
Letting Go in Lago Vista
- 2518 Straight Creek Dr. [HAR]
