Still Available: Heights Hippie Workshop Compound with Next-Door Crash Pad

No, this isn’t the Neighborhood Guessing Game. But there’s got to be a story behind this place.

The 2,714-square-foot “workshop” building on the corner of 9th and Harvard in the Heights, which apparently dates from 1920, has been for sale since March. It’s listed, along with a 911-sq.-ft. bungalow next door along 9th St., for $430,000 — marked down from $472,000 with 2 stops along the way.

Wanna peek inside?

***

Up those stairs is this study . . .

With a view of the happenin’ scene below:

The adjacent bungalow:

19 Comment

  • Nice space. It would be great place for a store.

  • Sell it to Allegro Builders!

  • Oh yeah.. I’ve run by this place many times.. This would be a great place for my coffee/ice cream/pub idea..

  • Are those burlap bags filled with green coffee, perchance? If I had a million dollars I’d open up a retail coffee roastery there…

  • Zippy and Jesica, I see a business partnership here!

    Pool some money and make it happen!

    It’s a good location just a block from Heights Blvd.

    Local based coffee shops are the rage. Add a sandwich shop or bakery component (or both) and you’ll have really nice place there.

  • At one point there was an old sign in the window (may still be there) that led me to think it used to be a store specializing in Victorian-style ornamentations, like stained glass and gingerbread trim and stuff. I guessed it was in business during the height of the renovation boom in the Heights, the one that preceded the current demolition boom.

  • kjb434 has an interesting idea, although sadly I can only splash around at the shallow end of the money pool… Speaking of pools, did anyone notice that the map on HAR places this in Dickinson?

  • Yeah, I notice HAR made this mistake on several address I check from Swamplot.

    I just copy the address to Google Maps now. That’s when I realized this was a good location.

    One block from Heights boulevard with two other buildings across the street that have parking. Ones a church! Sunday morning coffee anyone. Is the parking lot across the street for a school?

  • i’ll guess somewhere in the heights… maybe around 9th and harvard…

    fingers crossed!! i still havent won one of these..

  • I drove past this place yesterday and also wondered why its empty. It is a great location for a coffee bar / bistro type restaurant. Its only 2 blocks from the 11th street action, and this corner has a lot of traffic, especially with a church and a school right across the street. If only being a restaurateur weren’t such a risky business …..

  • The coffee shop idea might work, but without liquor sales, it’s even tougher to make the pay grade. I think this is within the dry area of the Heights. Someone correct me if ah beez wrong.

  • that neighborhood needs a tattoo/hotrod shop…

    with latenight keg parties featuring live local music.

  • They already have that at on 6th street (White Oak Bayou Drive).

  • Irt was a woodworking shop that did custom trims into the 90’s. I recall the owner, who was maybe in his mid 30s at the time, moved to somplace much smaller.
    The problem in turning it into any retail establishment is, as always, parking. The neighbors would scream. It is kitty-corner to Harverd Elem. and across the street from a Bapist Church in a dry part of the Heights.
    It needs an artist who can afford a great workspace.

  • dry part of the Heights? This is never actually enforced.

  • Dry area not enforced? Might want to call TABC on that one. If this was true The Heights would be overrun with restaurants with full mixed beverage permits. The map of the Dry Area can only be circumvented with a private club license. That is why most restaurants look for space just outside the perimeter. The dry area should be repealed anyway. It is outdated now that the city of Houston has jurisdiction over the Heights.

  • The dry area is enforced! Stop at the convenience store at 14th and the Blvd. and ask where they keep the beer.

    The dry area is not really very big and many locals do not want to see any change. The private club approach is working or Shade in 19th, and besides, we fear that with a repeal, there would soon be a giant Ferris wheel and a Joe’s Crab Shack on the Blvd. Aren’t those faux Victorians tacky enough?

  • SOLD! Anyone going to claim it?

    In my opinion the dry area is only working if you believe the slow deterioration of all the retail property within the dry area is somehow a good thing. The dry area just tends to force the neighborhood towards becoming completely residential which in no way prevents people putting up ugly buildings. Repeal it already.

  • Hummmm- there isn’t a lot of retail in the area and, having lived here since ’81, it looks to me that the main dry retail areas, Yale Street and 19th street, have been steadily improving this decade. If you are suggesting that chain stores would be much better, you would not be the first.

    Or if you are suggesting that the many watering holes at White Oak and Studemont would be preferable to the many law offices on the boulevard…What can I say – there are people who actually do not like Beer Island.