Tuesday, February 26, 2013
February 26, 2013 – 3:15 pm
And here’s what BHP Billiton Petroleum’s new 30-story tower might look like. The company announced yesterday that construction will begin at 1500 Post Oak in November on the fifth skyscraper at Four Oaks Place; the proposed 560,000-sq.-ft. building, going up where a vacant 24-Hour Fitness now sits, will be connected by a skybridge to the company’s existing 1360 Post Oak building. BHP says that the twinnish towers are meant to consolidate the company’s entire workforce in Uptown.
Rendering: Houston Business Journal
Read more about: 77056, Four Oaks Place, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Skyscrapers, Uptown
Friday, February 15, 2013
February 15, 2013 – 4:08 pm
Ah, Friday: Why not take a stroll down Binz St. in the Museum District and have a look at what’s going on? Let’s head east from here: the corner of La Branch and Binz, near the Children’s Museum.
Our guide, Swamplot reader David Hollas, provides the photos and the observations:
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Read more about Apartments, Commercial Real Estate, Construction Materials, Land Development, Medical Buildings, Mixed Use, Neighborhoods: Museum District, New Construction, Office Buildings, Photography, Proposed Developments, Renovations, Retail, Senior Living, Streets
Read more about: 77004, Apartments, Commercial Real Estate, Construction Materials, Lots, Medical Buildings, Museum District, New Construction, Office Buildings, Photography, Retail, Senior Living, Street
Friday, February 8, 2013
Thursday, February 7, 2013
February 7, 2013 – 1:00 pm
A Swamplot reader sends in photos of this Travis St. office building’s — well, stuccover. Gone are the striped awnings and gas light (pictured at the top) likely added during the building’s New Orleans Revival phase. Also gone is a trick-of-the-eye mural continuing those awnings (and window-fronting balcony railings, too) painted on the brick load-bearing wall that faces south toward Francis St. Built in 1959, the 4,741-sq.-ft. Midtown office space was purchased last June.
Want to see more of the stuccover?
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Read more about: 77006, Midtown, Mod, Office Buildings, Renovations
February 7, 2013 – 9:30 am
If you like intensely cinematic video renderings of former housewares stores set to a really rocking soundtrack, you’re going to love this one: It’s Block 10 West Office Park! This screenshot from the video shows how developer Hicks Ventures plans to maintain fidelity to the original I-10 site near Beltway 8, retaining the parking lot that used to front the former Great Indoors, which Sears sold along with 9 other stores about a year ago.
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Read more about: I-10, Interiors, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Renovations
Thursday, January 24, 2013
January 24, 2013 – 1:30 pm
Squatters and street artists might have to find another bygone building to pick on — but that’s only assuming there’s something really behind the renderings of renovations to Midtown’s Central Square Plaza that Claremont Property has been floating around. Could that demure stone mosaic on the wall facing Webster finally get its comeuppance after years of playing hard to get?
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Read more about: 77002, Midtown, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Real Estate Marketing, Renovations, Vacant Buildings
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
January 16, 2013 – 2:34 pm
Back in 2010, Skanska said it was going to build and finance an office building in the Galleria all on its own. Swamplot showed you the first and second Kirksey-designed renderings. This one’s the third. And there’s another detail to add to the story: Skanska announced today that Datacert will be the first tenant. Though the planned 20-story, 300,000-sq.-ft. building at 3009 Post Oak is still under construction, Skanska says that Datacert should be able to move in on the 10th and 11th floors later this summer. Right now, the 15-year-old “enterprise legal management solutions” company is headquartered in a building a few doors down at 3040 Post Oak.
Rendering: Swamplot inbox
Read more about: 77056, Commercial Real Estate, Galleria, Highrises, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Renting, Uptown
Monday, January 7, 2013
January 7, 2013 – 4:30 pm
What’s this? Near the intersection of W. Gray and Milam, a for-sale sign has popped up on the Central Square Plaza buildings on a 1-acre lot in Midtown. We’re hoping to get more details soon. The fate of the 12- and 14-story offices and parking garage at 2100 Travis has been tied up in court for years; Swamplot reported last summer that owner Alfred J. Antonini won a skirmish in a ongoing battle against the city, which had in 2011 ordered him to make “a bunch of repairs” to the buildings, vacant now for a real long time.
Photo: Swamplot inbox (sign); LoopNet
Read more about: 77002, Buildings for Sale, Lawsuits, Midtown, Office Buildings, Signage, Vacant Buildings
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
January 2, 2013 – 2:09 pm
Going, going . . . gone?: The company auctioning off the contents of the Houston Club ahead of its move to the 49th floor of One Shell Plaza gleefully reports on its website that the Jesse Jones-era 18-story office building at 811 Rusk is “scheduled for demolition!” That’s more than Skanska, which owns the building, has officially announced, though the Swedish construction firm’s own website does note that “future redevelopment” is planned for the Downtown site. [Lewis & Maese via CultureMap; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Silberman Properties
Read more about: 77002, Demolitions, Downtown, Office Buildings, Redevelopment
Friday, November 30, 2012
November 30, 2012 – 10:57 am
Those of you waiting with bated breath for the renovation, redevelopment, or removal of the 1950s-era office building at 3400 Montrose Blvd. (across Hawthorne St. from the Montrose Kroger): keep on bating. The company that bought the vacant 10-story building last September has told its 500 Israeli investors that its operations in Israel and Houston are both “in dire financial straits,” according to a report in Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
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Read more about: 77006, 77023, Commercial Real Estate, Country Club Place, Mixed Use, Montrose, Office Buildings, Real Estate Investing, Vacant Buildings
Thursday, November 15, 2012
November 15, 2012 – 3:13 pm
After slinking its nameplate away from a prominent site in North Montrose sometime after the company’s name became a not-so-revered household word in the aftermath of the late-noughts financial meltdown and the $182 billion in government bailouts it received (see sign-free photo at right from last month), insurance giant AIG has decided the froth has subsided enough that it can call itself AIG again. This week a new shroud disguising a new-again three-letter logo was lifted on the 42-story America Tower — er, AIG Building — in the American General Center at 2929 Allen Pkwy.
Photos: Candace Garcia
Read more about: 77019, AIG, Highrises, North Montrose, Office Buildings, Real Estate Marketing
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
November 13, 2012 – 4:37 pm
A report today confirms what a reader told Swamplot yesterday — that Southwestern Energy plans to build a 10-story office building in Springwoods Village, the new eco-themed community being carved out of a forested area just south of the new ExxonMobil corporate campus at the intersection of I-45 North and the future Grand Parkway. An additional lot for expansion is being preserved on an adjacent site. Reporter Emily Wilkinson guesses that Southwestern could be the mystery company that bought up 22 acres of Springwoods Village last year. [Houston Business Journal] Map: Springwoods Village
Read more about: 77389, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Springwoods Village
Monday, November 12, 2012
November 12, 2012 – 3:52 pm
“Just got off the phone with a Southwestern Energy employee and they announced they are building a new building. The building will be located on 45 near the Exxon Mobil campus. I remember a previous article stating something about there being more office buildings built in the Springwoods development. This is where I surmise it will be. It will be 10-stories high with room for expansion on an adjacent site. Completion date is set for 2014.” [Swamplot inbox] Map: Springwoods Village
Read more about: 77389, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Springwoods Village
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
September 12, 2012 – 5:17 pm
Where else? After “several months of thoughtful searching,” the chairman and CEO of ConocoPhillips spinoff Phillips 66 has announced the location for the multi-building headquarters campus it plans to build: on the Beltway 8 feeder road in Westchase, just north of Westheimer. Right next door to Homewood Suites and the Fairfield Inn. The campus will include a training and development center, conference space, a credit union office, a wellness center, plus a cafeteria, coffee shop, and — yes — a convenience store. The email announcement doesn’t mention whether the Phillips 66 food mart will be part of a Phillips 66 gas station facing Beltway 8, but CEO Greg Garland reports the company is “still in the conceptual design process” with its architect. A grander entrance to the 14.2-acre property will likely be pulled off of City West Blvd. Construction is expected to take 2 to 3 years once the design is completed.
Image: Phillips 66
Read more about: 77042, Freeways and Toll Roads, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments, Westchase
Has Midtown become too hip even for the federal government? The Social Security Administration is leaving, having lost its lease at the low-slung building at 3100 Smith (shown at right), reports CultureMap’s Whitney Radley: “
Comment of the Day: Recreating Great Moments in Big Box History
“Ironically the glass facade is strikingly similar to a designed, but never built Great Indoors store prototype that was slated to open in 2004. The prototype coincided with the merger of Sears with Kmart when all new concept development (and gross profit) for Sears ceased. Pity.” [Hdtex, commenting on Great New Indoors Replacing The Old Great Indoors]