LOW-CAL RESTAURANT TO OPEN INSIDE WESTHEIMER’S HIGH STREET REDEVELOPMENT 
The shell shown here was about as high as High Street got before the ambitious mixed-use development was scrapped in 2008. In 2011, the property was sold and the project downsized by Dinerstein and given a timeless, compensatory new name: Millennium High Street. Yesterday, reports the Houston Business Journal, the redevelopment at 4410 Westheimer announced a new tenant: Season 52, a low-calorie restaurant with 2 other Texas locations, will open sometime this April. Besides the restaurant, reports Olivia Pulsinelli, Millennium High Street is expected to include 15,000 square feet of retail and 336 apartments. [Houston Business Journal; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Swamplot inbox
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Tag: Highland Village
COMMENT OF THE DAY: WON’T GET MOVED AGAIN “The move out procedure has been pretty crazy so far. You have to go and schedule your move out date (down to a 4hr window) to qualify for any of the incentives (a month of rent back) if they catch you moving outside of the window they claim they could hold out on the incentive. You have to make the move out appointment soon, i.e. in the next couple days. What we found was that it made for a difficult time finding a new place given the strong rental market right now. My family member is on a fixed income, so we needed cheap with easy bus access. We got her in to Maryland Manor, on Bissonnet, should be a stable community for awhile, and they had lots of space.” [MH005, commenting on 4444 Westheimer Residents To Be Gently Escorted from Their Domiciles]
“Move out concierges” are standing by to assist renters in the massive 4444 Westheimer apartment complex to deal with their impending evictions residence transitions. “Each resident has a specific member of our concierge team assigned to assist them to make their transition as smooth as possible,” a release sent to the Chronicle by property owner Oliver McMillan states. “In addition, we have developed a comprehensive move out package which includes a listing of neighboring communities, moving procedures and an incentive plan. The move-out plan includes incentive payments for up to a one-month rebate of rent plus return of full security deposits. Our concern for our residents is that we help them find a new home and that their move from 4444 Westheimer is done in a safe manner for everyone who lives there.”
No matter their function, the presence of actual concierges should help upgrade the overall feel of the property, which used to be known as the Westcreek Apartments. Oliver McMillan plans to move it, too: To River Oaks. After the apartments near the corner of Westcreek and Westheimer (just west of the Highland Village Shopping Center) are demolished (sparing units north of Bettis Ave.), the company plans to change the property’s name to the River Oaks District, and begin construction there of a $275 million mixed-use center.
What’s going to replace the Willowick Court Townhomes (at right) at the corner of West Alabama and Las Palmas, west of Weslayan? Newer townhomes — at least for the strip along the west side of Las Palmas, on the western edge of the property. It’ll be covered with 38 3-story townhomes, about a dozen of them with rooftop patios. For the larger portion of the 11-acre site, Martin Fein Interests is planning 2 big blocks of apartments. The block pictured above from West Alabama will have 325 units in 6 stories on top of a 2-level parking garage, with a garden and pool in the courtyard and towers at the corners. Another 188-unit block lining West Main will have 7 stories on top of a single-level garage and feature an 8th-floor wine bar on the southeast corner (at left in the above image), a source tells Swamplot. The view below shows that building’s southeast corner, with the larger structure visible beyond it:
In Highland Village (the subdivision), this single-story 1950 home with single-slot garage is 2 sidewalk-free blocks south of Highland Village (the shopping center). A somewhat-reconfigured painted-brick home remodeled in 2000, the property listed 2 weeks ago at $429,000. Its interior has an open living-dining area overlooking a patio and pool, and the entry-with-bar shares that view. Beyond the back fence runs an easement for power lines and train tracks in a no-horn zone.
The arches are gone, and new steel is up: Reader Ken Barnes sends in this shot of the rather extensive “renovations” taking place on the former Village Kids and Janie & Jack building across the street from Central Market at 3838 Westheimer, down the street from the Highland Village Shopping Center. It’ll be the Houston area’s third Pinkberry, the first inside the Loop.
- Previously on Swamplot: Houston Pinkberry No. 3: Across from Central Market
Photo: Ken Barnes
HOUSTON PINKBERRY NO. 3: ACROSS FROM CENTRAL MARKET 
On the occasion of the opening of the Houston area’s second Pinkberry (in the Woodlands Mall, tomorrow), the frozen-yogurt franchisor is announcing its first inside-the-loop location: next to Walgreens, across the street from Central Market in the retail building formerly occupied by Village Kids and Janie and Jack — at 3838 Westheimer. The first area Pinkberry (pictured at right) opened last year off the Gulf Fwy. in Webster. Photo: Tone N.
Here’s a better look at the 35-story designed-in-Dallas residential tower PM Realty Group is putting on the northeast corner of Weslayan and West Alabama, where the State Grille and rebel predecessor Confederate House stood until a few years ago. Inside, at last report: 250-ish fancy apartments, a 3,000-sq.-ft. fitness center, a parking garage attached at the belly, and 12,500 sq. ft. of restaurant space on a bottom floor or two. The tower is being called either 2900, 2801, or 2800 Weslayan, depending on whether you follow that sign posted on the property earlier this year, a recent correction applied to it (below), or the project’s bid documents, which went out late last month and are due soon.
Sure, it’s a temporary fix, but it does make those shot-out glass panels on the brand-new Apple Store in Houston’s Highland Village Shopping Center look all clean and sleek again — if not a little gun-shy. The shattered panel above the Westheimer Rd. entrance has been smoothed over with a covering of adhesive black film. For symmetry’s sake, the film has been applied to the adjacent panel as well, to frame out a new large Apple logo decal in the center. The new decal stands in for the now obscured glowing Apple logo fixture that hangs in the same location just behind the window:
COMMENT OF THE DAY: ABOUT THAT 35-STORY TOWER ABOUT TO GO UP DOWN THE STREET “I need some opinions. A friend of mine owns a patio home on W Alabama next to this site. Will this help or hurt her property value? There’s a one acre tract between this development and hers, and we don’t know what it’s going to be. I figure it might help her value because it will be near retail and probably a restaurant or two, but who knows?” [Bill, commenting on First Sign of the 35-Story Apartment Tower Coming to Weslayan and West Alabama]
Here’s the sign that’s gone up on the northeast corner of Weslayan and West Alabama, where PM Realty plans to start construction later this year on the 35-story apartment tower it announced last year. The tower, PM Realty’s first in Houston, will have 12,500 sq. ft. of retail space on the first or second floor, 250 apartments, and a 3,000-sq.-ft. fitness center, according to a Houston Business Journal report last year. On the 2.6-acre site, which the company bought from Interfin last August: the remains of the State Grille restaurant. New on-the-scene blog Going Up! City has these pix of the site:
A reader passes on the rumor that the retail buildings along the west side of Mid Lane north of Westheimer, from Capone’s Bar and Oven (above) up to but not including Crapitto’s Cucina, are under contract to a developer — with a closing scheduled for this month. Purported plans for the properties: demolition and the construction of a highrise, with new retail spaces at the bottom. No rush, though, apparently: “They can’t do anything for 16 months because of the leases.”
Photo: Swamplot inbox
Here’s a shot of the now-vacant corner of Weslayan and West Alabama, where PM Realty Group has announced it’ll be constructing a 35-story apartment building and parking garage — with a restaurant and “service retail” — beginning next year. The 2.6-acre site is the former location of the Confederate House at 2925 Weslayan, later known as the State Grille, which was torn down in 2008. PM Realty bought the site from Giorgio Borlenghi’s Interfin Cos. last month. No renderings from PM Realty’s architects, RTKL, have been passed around yet.
- Luxury high-rise apartments planned inside the Loop [Houston Business Journal]
- Tower to rise on former Confederate House site [Prime Property]
- PM Realty Group Unveils Plans for New High-Rise Multifamily Project [PMRG]
- Previously on Swamplot: State Grille Demolition: Just for the Hell of It, State Grille Closing Down; 27-Story Tower Going Up?
Photo: Candace Garcia
LOOSCAN LIBRARY LEAKAGE 
Why is the Looscan Neighborhood Library at 2510 Willowick near Highland Village closing for 4 months of renovations — only 4 years after it was built? Problems with water infiltration. “When it rains pretty good, water gets into those walls and into that doorway,” a library spokesperson tells Charlotte Aguilar. Both entrances will get new exterior canopies, and the lobby will get a new walk-off mat system to catch tracked-in water and prevent slipping. Plus: new moisture-resistant wall finishes and stone baseboards. Work begins a week from Saturday. [River Oaks Examiner] Photo: River Oaks Examiner
JUST DROPPING IN AGAIN TO SAY HELLO Business is booming at Sprinkles, next door to the site of the future Apple Store in Highland Village, David Kaplan reports. During the demolition of the vacant retail building on the site, pieces of structural steel crashed into the cupcake shop on 3 separate occasions. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot]