A MIDTOWN BEER BAR IS BORN Who’s the mama? “A craft beer bar will be coming to Midtown in roughly the same time it takes to conceive and gestate a baby. Except this baby’s father is one of the most esteemed bar owners in town. And the baby will have a diet primarily composed of small-batch craft beers. It’ll be taking up residence next to another beloved bar, right along the light rail, making this small section of Midtown suddenly infinitely more intriguing.” [Eating Our Words]
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Tag: Bars and Clubs
Last Friday, a former St. Anne’s Catholic School P.E. teacher named Jonathan Barnes pled guilty to 4 counts of federal charges in connection with a multimillion-dollar oil-trading kickback scheme. What does the Bellaire resident have to do with the 360 Sports Lounge on Washington Ave? The plea agreement he signed last week spells it out: His investment in the bar was a kickback itself, one of many gifts given to him by his 2 alleged co-conspirators, to thank him for overcharging his employer, Houston Refining (now a part of LyondellBasell) by as much as $82 million for shipping contracts he arranged with their companies.
Why might Barnes have figured that a new Washington Ave sports bar would be a good investment? Well, his stint at Enron in the early 1990s had given him a solid business background.
COMMENT OF THE DAY: UNLESS, OF COURSE, THEY SHOW URBAN COWBOY EVERY NIGHT AT MIDNIGHT “In regard to Sundance Cinemas, that’s potentially great news, but honestly, I wonder if it won’t succumb to the same fate as its predecessor. Even if it manages to reel in the handful of film buffs gasping for air in this sprawling sea of easily titillated Transformers, it still has to deal with being in a somewhat awkward spot. I just don’t see the independent film crowd planning a night of avant-garde cinema and theme bar hopping. Yee-haw, Thaddeus! Ride that bull.” [kilray, commenting on Report: Sundance Cinemas Replacing Angelika Film Center at Bayou Place; Bar Smorgasbord Moving in Upstairs]
The city of Houston and the Cordish Company are “deep into negotiations” with Sundance Cinemas to take over the former Angelika Theater spot at Bayou Place, Steven Thomson reports. Robert Redford’s Sundance Group has operated 2 Sundance Cinemas since 2007 — an 8-screen complex in San Francisco and a 6-screen multiplex in Madison, Wisconsin. If Sundance does end up taking over the vacant Angelika space at 510 Texas St. and maintains all existing screens, it would tie with the Sundance Kabuki Cinema near Pacific Heights as the largest complex in the small chain. The company appears to have scaled back the aggressive expansion plans it announced 4 years ago, which included new theaters in Chicago and Denver. The Angelika Film Center closed suddenly last summer.
WHAT IT TAKES TO GET INTO THE VINTAGE LOUNGE This week’s Houston Press exposé on velvet-rope racism includes several first-hand accounts of actual sightings of minorities inside the Rice Village’s Hudson Lounge — and this sweet little nugget of nightclub strategery from Amir Ansari, owner of the Vintage Lounge at 2108 Kipling (across the street from Petsmart): “‘A bar is like a prison, and we have to keep our population in check,‘ [Ansari] says. ‘We are outnumbered 100 to one — we have to prescreen. I’m not letting eight random guys come in in a group. They will usually start fights or bother the girls, which makes matters even worse.’ . . . Ansari has structured the dress code at Vintage to encourage long-term business, or so he hopes. Patrons sporting designer labels such as Dolce & Gabbana or Armani will move on to the next trendy bar soon enough, while more casually clad customers in button-up shirts and khakis are more loyal, he says. Beyond that, ‘We don’t allow graphic printed shirts. No Affliction stuff — nothing you would see on Jersey Shore,’ Ansari adds. ‘No baggy hip-hop stuff, but even that style is dying off.'” [Houston Press; previously on Swamplot]
COMMENT OF THE DAY: HOW KIDS CAN HELP MAKE WAY FOR MORE ALCOHOL SALES IN AND AROUND THE HEIGHTS “If HISD closes Hogg [Middle School] (it’s been identified as one of 66 struggling schools), that may open up some of the Studewood/ 11th area for liquor sales. How far do you need to be from a church to get an alcohol permit?” [Holster, commenting on The Rush to White Oak: Is the Corkscrew Next?]
Update, 12/22: Late Nite Pie has reopened!
It looks like there’s been another shut-down at Late Nite Pie in Midtown. As first noted by the Houston Press late yesterday, the entrance to the pizza joint has been boarded up, with a stern-sounding note warning off trespassers and indicating the locks have been changed. The person listed as a contact on the note (presumably from the property’s landlord) would not comment on the situation. It may be a bit early to count Late Night out, though: Bell’s restaurant was able to start up again after a similar shuttering last year. The restaurant moved to its current location at 302 Tuam (on the corner of Baldwin) in 2008.
- Previously on Swamplot: Late Night Pie Scheduled To Reopen Monday, The Late Late Night Pie, Latest on the Late Late Night Pie Location
Photo: Aaron Carpenter
“You wouldn’t believe the amount of hate mail that I have received since I closed it,” owner Andrew Adams says about the Corkscrew, the wine bar he and his brother Doyle opened way back in 2006 — the early days of the new Washington Ave — but shut down last year. But Adams has been paying attention. He tells the HBJ‘s Allison Wollam he’s planning to reopen the Corkscrew in the Heights in February, as well as a second location elsewhere, which he plans to call Little Corkscrew. Where in the Heights? Adams won’t say, “because he’s still negotiating leases,” but he says he’s “considering” a building on White Oak.
If the Corkscrew does make the move to White Oak, it’ll be joining several new restaurant neighbors: Christian’s Tailgate, Tacos A Go-Go, and D’Amico’s Italian Market Cafe.
The Adams brothers recently gave up on the Corkscrew’s successor, an organic-style cocktail bar they eventually called Sugarcane, after all of 5 months. They’ll be leasing out their space at 1919 Washington to club owners who plan to open a “trendy, upscale bar, complete with bottle service,” he tells Wollam:
Skybar owner Scott Gertner has found a new space for his jazz club. It’ll be on the 3rd floor of Houston Pavilions — one block west of the House of Blues and Lucky Strike, and directly across the open-air mall from “swing space” originally planned for retail but now being leased as office space by an energy company. Scott Gertner’s Skybar, on the 10th floor of the office building at 3400 Montrose, closed over the summer, after Gertner tired of dealing with building maintenance issues left unaddressed by a new owner.
Houston Pavilions’ 3rd floor is pretty high up there, but Gertner says the new venue will drop the SkyBar name for the multi-level space (it’ll just be called Scott Gertner’s). At 13,000 sq. ft. (and a capacity of 700), it’ll be slightly larger than the old club too. He tells Chronicle reporter Joey Guerra the new interior, designed by Uptown Sushi architect Isaac Preminger, will feature 3 outdoor patios, an “arena-style” stage, and a full kitchen. Directly downstairs from the club, at the corner of Dallas and Fannin: BCBGMaxAzria and McCormick & Schmick’s, shown above.
- Scott Gertner comes downtown [29-95]
- Houston Pavilions Coverage [Swamplot]
- Previously on Swamplot: Why Scott Gertner’s Skybar Is Leaving the Montrose Sky, Scott Gertner’s Skybar Closing, May Take the Whole Building with It
Photo: Flickr user sabotai
A “high-end” restaurant, led by a yet-to-be-identified “superstar chef,” will be taking over the space known for the last 16 years as Chances Bar, an owner of the property tells Houston Press reporter Craig Hlavaty. “It’s going to blow Montrose out,” Nick Vastakis tells him. “It’s going to be great.” Chances will shut down for good after a goodbye party on Saturday. Vastakis says his family, which has owned the property since the 1970s, will be getting out of the lesbian-bar management business and into property development.
What prompted the change? One of those spear-more-times-with-my-family moments, he tells Hlavaty:
THE NEXT NEIGHBOR IN LINE FOR 2520 ROBINHOOD WON’T MIND GETTING WET 
Hudson Lounge owner Adam Kleibert is hoping his new bar directly to the east of the 2520 Robinhood at Kirby condo tower will get better treatment from his neighbors than the drenching and projectile greetings Hans’ Bier Haus directly to the west received last year. And he tells the HBJ‘s Allison Wollam that he and his brothers have some plans for the rest of the property they own directly adjacent to the tower. Once the lending market turns around, he says, they’d like to build a 33-room boutique hotel with a rooftop pool on the site. Kleibert says the Hudson Lounge is already planning a reception expressly for condo residents. [Houston Business Journal; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Candace Garcia
“It was an unfortunate leasing issue and nothing else,” say the owners of the Gallant Knight. And so the bar will be closing December 31st “at least for now.” Will there be an everyone-out-before-midnight New Year’s Eve party? The landlord of the bar’s new location at 2511 Bissonnet just east of Kirby didn’t renew the lease, an email from the bar explains: “We have just 60 days to empty our liquor cabinet.” An investor group led by Cushman & Wakefield director Stephen Schneidau bought the name and contents of the 34-year-old neighborhood bar at the corner of Holcombe and Morningside shortly after it closed in 2006, then reopened on Bissonnet almost a year and a half ago. Now sitting on the site of the bar’s original location at 2337 W. Holcombe: a branch of Comerica Bank.
- The Gallant Knight [Facebook]
- The Gallant Knight returns in retro fashion [Houston Business Journal]
Photo: Eating Our Words
The tiny urban island clustered around Midtown’s Ensemble/HCC Metro station has grown. Three new businesses on Main St. just north of Winbern will celebrate official grand openings this weekend, expanding the little block of happenin’ north of the Continental Club. Carved out of the rehabbed single-story building at 3622 Main St.: New retail outlets My Flaming Heart and Shop-o-Rama, plus Natachee’s Supper ’n Punch, a food, bar, and concert venue that features a large vacant side yard currently occupied by the owner’s horse, Lacy, and a kiddie sandbox. (Eventual plans for the yard call for a patio and awning, picnic tables, an outdoor bar, and a small stage for live music.) Also moving into the Winbern side of the building, from the block to the south: music and tiki exotica outlet Sig’s Lagoon. (The old Sig’s Lagoon location is being converted to a “Mexican wares” store.) A coffee shop and a rockabilly-themed combo barber shop, beauty and tattoo parlor are planned for the 2 remaining spaces in the 100-ft.-by-100-ft. building, though currently they’re being used for construction storage. The mix is modeled after stores on South Congress around property owner Bob Schultz’s original Continental Club in Austin.
Got a question about something going on in your neighborhood you’d like Swamplot to answer? Sorry, we can’t help you. But if you ask real nice and include a photo or 2 with your request, maybe the Swamplot Street Sleuths can! Who are they? Other readers, just like you, ready to demonstrate their mad skillz in hunting down stuff like this:
Answers — of a sort — to your questions-about-town:
- Southwest Freeway: More than a week after our source noted the problem, that dangling loop of fiber-optic lighting gone dim is still taped to a cable (see photos above) on the Dunlavy St. bridge. TxDOT, the agency in charge of the lights, has swooped in to fix problems with the lights sporadically since at least 2004. But the situation has apparently accelerated to the late-drooping stage. What’s next? Are they just gonna leave us hanging?
- North Montrose: Pat Wente finds the source of the Regent-Square area jackhammering: demolition of a slab leftover from the Allen House demo on West Dallas (see photo below). And hears Bernard’s somewhat blunt though unofficial assessment of the prognosis for construction on the giant mixed-use project:
WHO WANTS NUMBERS NOW? 
The Press‘s Katharine Shilcutt passes on the latest: “And in perhaps the strangest news this year, rumblings are coming from reliable sources that Numbers (314 Westheimer) — recently put up for lease — is being eyed by the Pappas family. Yes, that Pappas family. But wait — it gets weirder. The rumors also indicate that they plan to open either a chicken and rice or shrimp and rice joint in the spot where so many … unsavory … activities have taken place over the years. If the rumors prove to be true, would you eat at Numbers’ Chicken & Rice?” [Eating Our Words; previously on Swamplot]
