A reader sends in photos of the new Hess Tower, formerly known as Discovery Tower, under construction adjacent to Discovery Green Downtown.
You can see the tower isn’t quite finished yet but it sure looks like that plaza in front of it already is! Though really, all those office workers look a little young, don’t you think?
More pics:
Hot off the Swamplot tipline: Discovery Tower, going up across McKinney St. from Discovery Green Downtown, has its first tenant — and it’ll be taking the whole building.
Beginning in late 2011 — about the time Hess’s current lease at One Allen Center expires — the 30-story tower with the wind turbines on top will be renamed Hess Tower.
After the jump, details from an email announcing the move — sent out to Hess Corporation employees late this morning:
Never mind the virtual obstacles: The website for Discovery Tower has a new promotional video that pays silent homage to Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. Also: more fancy renderings of the office building, now under construction.
More interesting to Discovery Green fans, though, will be a few new aerial renderings that depict the Downtown park in urban glory, surrounded by a crowd of real, planned, imagined, and soon-to-be-axed new projects. But . . . uh, which is which?
That orangish tower perched on Discovery Green’s southwest corner: the stalled 22-story Embassy Suites hotel. That sorta-identical but mirrored Hilton Americas on the north side of the park? The Convention Center Hotel Part Two!
So . . . what’s going on behind Discovery Tower?
New drawings and details appear of Discovery Tower, the 30-story office building now under construction at the northwest corner of Discovery Green Downtown.
The wind turbines at the top of the building are still there. The brochure also mentions solar panels on the south face of the building, a green roof on top of the entrance pavilion, 2 stories of retail, as well as some old Houston favorites: 2 floors of underground parking (151 cars), and a 10-story, 1,350-space parking garage one block north, connected by . . . . an air-conditioned (phew!) skybridge!
After the jump, more green-hot Downtown tower architectural rendering porn!
From our email comes a message from a reader who has heard from someone involved in the project that the white poles shown at the top of the new Discovery Tower drawing are . . . indeed, wind turbines.
So . . . if they do end up being put in, how much energy will they bring to the building? And . . . how many tenants?
Thanks to an alert poster on HAIF, we now have a more up-to-date and better view of Discovery Tower, Trammel Crow’s 30-story office building — designed by Gensler and planned for a perch on the north side of Discovery Green Downtown.
Other HAIF participants have been speculating whether the shorter white poles at the top of the image are supposed to be . . . wind turbines!
Well, are they? Scrutinize a larger version of the rendering and judge for yourself . . . below the fold.
Here’s a small discovery from today’s permit report: Work on the site and foundation of Discovery Tower — a 30-story office tower developed by Trammell Crow and designed by Gensler — has been approved by the city. The tower is planned for a block next to Discovery Green downtown, at 1501 McKinney St.
The tower will have retail space at street level and will reportedly tie into the tunnel system . . . by skybridge. A new parking garage will go up one block north.
The tiny image above shows the view from Discovery Green. Discovery Tower is at the far right. (The hazy image in the background to the left is the Finger Companies’ One Park Place, which is now under construction.)
Got any better images of Discovery Tower you’d like to share? Send them in!
Photo: CBRE, via HAIF user lockmat
From melindamerola (Melinda Merola): Did it. RT @swamplot Coming Soon to San Felipe: Winetopia http://tinyurl.com/yzd7jb6From melindamerola (Melinda Merola): Edit: I *love* Swamplot! RT @swamplot The Houston Press Sez Some Nice Things About Us http://tinyurl.com/yhjre5o
From FoodPrincess (Joanne Witt): +2 RT @she_eats: Congrats @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GCFrom FoodPrincess (Joanne Witt): +2 RT @she_eats: Congrats @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From DavidLeftwich68 (David Leftwich): +1 RT @she_eats: Congrats @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From currentlysavvy (Carla Soriano): RT @she_eats: Congrats to @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From HoustonBlogBlog (Houston Blog Blog): RT @houston_foodie: RT @she_eats: Congrats to @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From houston_foodie (Houston Foodie): RT @she_eats: Congrats to @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From pennydelosantos (Penny De Los Santos): RT @she_eats Congrats to @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC
From she_eats (Katharine Shilcutt): Congrats to @HTownChowDown @BlueJeanGourmet @texanschick @swamplot @lmayes for being named Houston's best bloggers: http://is.gd/aM9GC