Swamplot Archives by Tag:
October 1, 2007 – 9:43 am
So much continuing excitement over the new 23-story tower proposed for the corner of Bissonnet and Ashby in Boulevard Oaks:
- Mayor White sends the city a letter: “I will be prepared to use any appropriate power under law to alter the proposed project as currently planned.” Just wait’ll we get a mayor who’s actually an architect.
- Next, the architect who wants to be mayor proposes a moratorium.
- Gentle opposition guest editorial in the Chronicle: “Imagine the diminished joy of looking out from your peaceful garden . . .”
- Wednesday: Protest rally!
- Interesting traffic analysis from Off the Kuff commenter Trafficnerd:
In my experience, the residents of the affected areas almost always object vociferously to the residential components of the project, yet give the typical ground level retail and restaurant uses a pass because they somewhat see those as desirable uses.
- What’s it gonna look like? See an actual drawing of the proposed tower, after the jump! Yes, it’s cartoonish, but it doesn’t look like the cartoon.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, Ashby Highrise, Boulevard-Oaks, Highrises, Neighborhood Disputes, Proposed Developments, Southampton
September 24, 2007 – 7:15 am
Another day, another round of Houston demolitions. Find out where the action is in our list of structures approved for destruction—after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, 77008, 77021, 77022, 77057, 77061, 77075, 77088, 77093, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
September 21, 2007 – 6:01 am
Yet another warehouse on Studemont goes down. Plus more homes in and around town. Our daily address list of demolition sites is after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77004, 77005, 77007, 77009, 77019, 77057, 77096, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
September 20, 2007 – 8:16 am
One advantage of keeping your Houston-style Big Tower in a Wealthy Residential Neighborhood project secret: You can plat the property, prepare traffic-impact studies, and upgrade utilities before anyone notices. One downside: Media-savvy neighbors might catch on and announce your project before you do. Or at least release renderings.
Here’s what Buckhead Investment Partners is saying about the 23-story mixed-use tower the company is planning for the current site of the Maryland Manor apartments, on the south side of Bissonnet near Dunlavy: A six-story base will include a 467-car parking garage, space for retail and a restaurant on the ground floor, and five live-work townhomes. An “amenity plaza” level on the sixth floor will have an exercise room, spa, and office space. Above it all: 17 floors of either apartments or condos.
Rainwater collection. LEED-Silver rating. Red-brick exterior with cast-stone details. But best of all is the spin:
The project design has been chosen so that all building residential units will be above the tree line, ensuring the greatest level of privacy for the surrounding neighborhood and the maximum view of Houston’s skylines and tree canopy from the units.
Emerging Boulevard Oaks development strategy: You won’t be able to see us, because we’ll be above the trees.
Read more about: 77005, Apartments, Ashby Highrise, Boulevard-Oaks, Condos, Green Development, Highrises, Mixed Use, Neighborhood Disputes, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Proposed Developments, Retail, Southampton, Trees, Utilities
8:16 am
|
Read more about Apartments, Condos, Development Strategy, Green Design and Development, Highrises, Mixed Use, Neighborhood Disputes, Neighborhoods: Boulevard Oaks, Neighborhoods: Southampton, New Construction, New Construction: Residential, Proposed Developments, Retail, Trees
September 19, 2007 – 8:56 am
The family of nanotechnology pioneer Richard Smalley has knocked a little more than $50,000 off the price of the late Nobel Prize winner’s Southampton home.
The 21-year-old, six-bedroom house has been on the market for more than two months. Arnoldy says she has had some trouble selling the three-story home, which features a gourmet kitchen and third-story deck, because it has virtually no yard. The 5,433-square-foot house sits on a 6,312-square-foot lot.
What do you mean, no yard? What this home clearly needs is an owner who can take advantage of small spaces.
Included in the sale—sort of: a Buckyball-shaped skylight over the Family Room.
“Rice University wants the skylight, but we see it more as a marketing tool to sell the home,” says Susan Arnoldy, a Realtor at John Daugherty Realtors Inc. who has listed the property for sale. “The new owner can decide whether or not they want to give it to Rice for display.”
New asking price: $1,295,000.
Read more about: 77005, Buying and Selling, Homes for Sale, Southampton
September 19, 2007 – 7:25 am
As autumn creeps in, Neighborhood Protection rolls up to demo a rundown home near U of H. Addresses for the protected property and eight other demo-bound houses are in our daily list.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77004, 77005, 77007, 77008, 77018, 77056, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
September 10, 2007 – 7:57 am
A bakery outlet is set free, plus other goings-on in the Houston demolition world. See our list of doomed-building addresses, after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, 77007, 77008, 77009, 77015, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
September 6, 2007 – 8:19 am
Buildings knocked down in the Rice Village for Sonoma. Plus demolition in Greenview Manor moves north. See the address listings in our daily report, after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, 77008, 77016, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions, Greenview-Manor, Rice-Village
September 4, 2007 – 10:13 am
From the design mags to demolition . . . in less than ten years! Remember the modern house with the curious metal proboscis off Bissonnet, near the Museum of Fine Arts? It won a couple of design awards a few years back from the American Institute of Architects, but if the judges had realized it was temporary housing it probably would have swept that category.
A week ago 1 Waverly Ct. appeared quietly in our demolition report, but it became a smashing success just a few days later. It was built in 1999.
After the jump, what lurked behind the proboscis: photos of this record-shattering short-timer from the architects’ website.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, Construction Materials, Demolitions, Home Design, Houston Architects, Museum-District
August 30, 2007 – 7:42 am
The construction permit for the Medical Clinic of Houston’s new six-story building on Sunset Blvd. in Southampton has been approved by the city. So up it goes! Behind the new building, facing Rice Blvd., will be a new seven-story, 600-space parking garage.
After the jump, a view of the new garage from the adjacent alley.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, Medical Clinics, Neighborhood Disputes, New Construction, Parking-Garages, Rice-University, Southampton
August 20, 2007 – 3:54 pm
Our story on the Rice Village’s Sonoma development last Thursday repeated KHOU reporter Lee McGuire’s claim:
The developer says potential buyers have reserved all but four of the new condos.
But Jennifer Friedberg’s writeup in this past weekend’s Chronicle sez otherwise:
A total of 115 of the 220 units for sale in Sonoma are already reserved, Tysor said.
That’s quite a number of buyers backing out of their reservations in a very short period, no? But even more curious is this:
The number of units continues to change depending on the square footage potential residents select for each condo.
Contracts won’t be signed until later in the process.
That’s right, ma’am, just tell us how big you’d like your kitchen and we’ll move the wall there.
Read more about: 77005, Buying and Selling, Development Strategies, New Construction: Residential, Proposed Developments, Rice-Village
August 16, 2007 – 10:43 pm
Ignoring the objections of snooty inner-loopers who think they’re somehow entitled to a continuous grid of streets, City Council voted yesterday to let a block of Bolsover in the Rice Village become two private circular driveways and a restaurant patio. The deal nets the city a whopping $1.5 million—the price of a couple of small luxury condos, maybe.
That’s the last hurdle for Sonoma, which appears to have gained two stories since its last appearance here. Developer Randall Davis claims buyers have “reserved” all but four of the 225 condos. There’s also 125,000 sq. ft. of retail and office space in the complex.
After the jump, a revised aerial view of the new Bolsover dropoff.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, Commercial Real Estate, Condos, Leasing, Mixed Use, New Construction, Randall Davis, Retail, Rice-Village, Streets
More homes around the city turn to dust. Plus a baker’s dozen demolitions in Greenview Manor—all after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, 77006, 77008, 77019, 77025, 77032, 77055, 77075, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
The Doyle Mansion gets its dismissal papers. Plus a Riverside Terrace teardown (you’re looking at it) and nine more homes say goodbye—all in today’s report.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77005, 77007, 77008, 77018, 77021, 77026, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
Four businesses and seven residences gained official release from the restricting confines of structural integrity yesterday. What’s going down? Our list of falling buildings is after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77003, 77004, 77005, 77006, 77009, 77018, 77019, 77026, 77030, 77081, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
A fast food icon quickly devoured, plus the end of a house on an oak-lined Woodland Heights street. Details after the jump.
Continue Reading This Story >
Read more about: 77004, 77005, 77007, 77009, 77019, 77055, 77056, 77087, Daily Demolition Report, Demolitions
