08/06/18 12:00pm

Today Swamplot is brought to you by the live-work space for sale at 218 Westcott St. in Rice Military. Thanks for supporting this site!

This unique property has served variously as a personal residence, a photo studio, a gallery, an office for a graphic-design firm — and even (once) as a wedding venue. Architect Frank Zeni designed the façade for artist and publisher John Bernhard, who fashioned the interior as his home and studio. How would you use it?

Stained concrete floors, a 20-ft. ceiling, and a central pillar of Louisiana driftwood define the gallery-like first floor. Cable railings line the perimeter of the loft-y second level, which gathers light from front and back windows. The 2,211-sq.-ft. property features 4 bedroom (or office) spaces. There’s parking for 6 cars in front.

218 Westcott sits 2 blocks north of Memorial Dr. and 5 blocks south of Washington Ave. The Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens, Brenner’s on the Bayou, the Beer Can House, Memorial Park, Buffalo Bayou Park, and the whole Wash Ave restaurant, nightlife, and arts district are just minutes from the front door.

Helpfully, the listing features photos of the interior in both unfurnished and office modes. Take a look at them and imagine the possibilities! The property is being offered for sale by Boulevard Realty agent Star Massing.

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Sponsor of the Day
08/06/18 11:00am

Here’s the next target in Houston’s continuing warehouse-to-brewery turnover trend: 1504 Chapman St. A group of local brewers got their hands on the 6,283-sq.-ft. building — pictured above from the south — in April and a budding Facebook page now shows its address as the location of a venue they’re calling Local Group Brewing.

It’s within the same general parish as St. Arnold’s recently-opened beer cathedral and existing brewery. They’re both less than half a mile away on the other side of the former Union Pacific brownfield pictured below, now giving rise to the complex of mixed-use buildings dubbed Hardy Yards:

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Aerial Redevelopment Reconaissance
08/06/18 9:30am

Saturday was teardown day for this Cherryhurst bungalow catty-corner to the Wilson Montessori School where the Indiana St. pavement goes brick for a single block. The 2-man crew pictured above made it about halfway through the job by the afternoon, leaving the yard beyond the fence littered with house parts as they slashed and sprayed.

Once the wreckage is cleared away, some kind of new single-family structure is slated to take over at 1524 Indiana St., according to plans the 5,000-sq.-ft. lot’s new-ish owner filed after buying it in May.

Here’s what the deconstruction looks like from Yupon:

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Half Off Everything
08/06/18 8:30am

Photo: BOldbury via Swamplot Flickr Pool

Headlines
08/03/18 4:00pm

SCHOOLS ARE NOW BUYING SPECIAL INSURANCE POLICIES IN CASE THEY GET SHOT UP The market for “active-assailant” insurance is alive and well, reports the Wall Street Journal, as more and more private schools, public schools, charters, and universities go on fiscal defense against the threat posed by fire-armed students — who cost districts a lot of money in counseling expenses, crisis management, extra security, and of course lawsuits. (“If you’re a risk manager for a school district, you have to look at it with the same eye that you might look at coverage for a tornado,” says a researcher at the University of South Carolina. “We live in a very litigious United States.”) The policies function as a type of gap insurance, covering expenses not typically included in general liability like funeral costs and death benefits, often up to $250,000 per victim. For smaller schools, premiums range from roughly $1,800 to $1 million, and for larger ones up to $20 million. Just last month, Ohio underwriter McGowan Program Administrators wrote over 60 policies, a representatives tells the WSJ. And of the 300 policies it’s written total, some have already been paid out. [Wall Street Journal; previously on Swamplot] Photo of Santa Fe High School, Santa Fe, Texas: Santa Fe ISD

08/03/18 3:00pm

Fasten your seat belts — it’s time for a detour down the new ramp TxDOT just opened off I-45 north to 59 north. Included in the footage: new views of the downtown skyline, along with some of an adjacent ramp now under construction between the 2 highways that’ll offer freeway sightseers an even higher vantage point when its open.

You can see it taking shape off to the left in the still photo below:

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Dashcam Footage
08/03/18 12:45pm

A new brewery is now in the works for the industrial building that sits across the Downtown 59 on-ramp from the Houston Center for Sobriety. Just like the adjacent drunk tank which opened in 2013, the new business at 100 N. Jackson will be housed in a repurposed warehouse. Its lawn includes several signs pointing drivers to the neighboring sobering center — like the one shown above fronting the exit ramp off the Eastex, on the west side of the soon-to-be beer venue dubbed Industry Brewery. (Also in the frame: signage for the building’s most recent tenant the American Engine & Grinding Company.)

At that corner, a left on Ruiz St. followed by another quick one on Chenevert gets you outside the recovery facility:

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Downtown Wet and Dry Spots
08/03/18 12:00pm

Our thanks today to our Sponsor of the Day: Houston’s own Central Bank. Swamplot appreciates the continuing support!

Central Bank has 4 (central) Houston branches available to meet your business or personal needs: in Midtown, the Heights, West Houston, and Post Oak Place.

Central Bank believes that change is essential to its success; the company actively pursues the latest in service, technology, and products. Central Bank aims to know its customers personally and to be their primary business and personal financial resource. The bank’s staff values relationships and strives to be available when you need them.

To learn more about how Central Bank can meet your banking needs, please call any of the following Senior Vice Presidents: Kenny Beard, at 832.485.2376; Bonnie Purvis, at 832.485.2354; or Carlos Alvarez, at 832.485.2372. You can also find out more on the bank’s website.

Reach Swamplot readers: Become a Sponsor of the Day

Sponsor of the Day
08/03/18 10:00am

A just-issued building permit indicates Aldi is now on its way to the north end of the Garden Oaks Shopping Center, pictured above, where it’ll occupy the spot formerly home to Yoga Collective — plus a little extra room the developer’s adding on to help it fit into the 95,046-sq.-ft. building. Before it arrives, exterior renovations will also make over the outer face of the strip.

Other comings and goings in the building just north of the North Loop: Life Savers 24-hour Emergency Room is taking over 6,300 sq.-ft., and Dollar Tree is due to relocate from its current spot in the main strip to the new freestanding building marked yellow in the site plan above.

Photo and site plan: Hartman

3938 N. Shepherd
08/03/18 8:30am

Photo of 2050 W. Sam Houston: Marc Longoria via Swamplot Flickr Pool

Headlines
08/02/18 3:30pm

Amid all the foliage inside 1118 Horseshoe Dr., the liveliest specimen is this vertical one; it rises from the rocky atrium by the front door all the way up to the skylight above the second-story railing. No word on the tree’s age, but the house went up in 1982 as part of the watery Sugar Lakes subdivision in Sugar Land. It’s now being shopped around at an asking price of $489,000.

An aerial view from up above the canopy shows the rooftop openings that facilitate photosynthesis:

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Green Listings