- 1419 Kirby Dr. [HAR]
Sign up for the Newsletter
Tag: River Oaks
- 3616 Ella Lee Ln. [HAR]
Pieces of the fencing surrounding the MacKie and Kamrath-designed ExxonMobil Upstream Research facility on Buffalo Spdwy. were spotted sprawled out on the grass yesterday along the campus perimeter after being plucked from their stations; more barriers are getting yanked up this morning, as seen in the second shot above. The property (which appears to have been transferred to the nonprofit Exxon Foundation in 2015 after the oil giant’s plans to offload the site were announced) was  sold this month to an entity directing its mail to real estate investment and development firm Spear Street Capital. A couple of readers report that other major shuffling around and cleaning out appear to have been going on at the facility for at least the last few weeks, with vehicles bearing the Precision Demolition logo making periodic guest appearances on the scene.
Across W. Alabama St. from the building’s more curvaceous end, the spot occupied until early last year by the empty shell of honky tonk Blanco’s has since been filled in with athletics stuff for St. John’s School:
Exxon Exit
The remodeling permit issued last fall for 2 Tiel Way (shown above in its previous listing portrait) was augmented by a demolition permit at the end of January, as Diane Cowen reports in this weekend’s Chronicle. The 1960s house (designed by Karl Kamrath, like a few others of the not-yet-demolished original houses on the street) was bought last July after a 10-month stint on the market; Cowen writes that the new owners had planned to restore the home, but structural issues including uncovered termite and water damage boosted cost estimates to around twice the likely cost of a rebuild.
The house was torn down to the slab and fireplace late last month, and some of the interior redwood paneling and light fixtures were salvaged. The new home designed for the site will purportedly mimic the old one to a significant extent — here’s a rendering from Robertson Design, the architecture firm of the new owners’ son:
Theseus’s Ranch
- 2200 Willowick Rd., 5CÂ [HAR]
- 3605 Del Monte Dr. [HAR]
The air-conditioned 2-story playhouse at 36 Tiel Way is on the market as of last Friday, along with its 5-bedroom mansion mate. The playhouse, featured as yesterday’s Home Listing Photo of the Day, was built back in 2011 by Kristi Schiller (the radio personality turned police-dog philanthropist formerly known as Lucy Lipps) and her husband. The playhouse includes running water, window planters, and a minifridge; the just-under-1-acre property backs up to Buffalo Bayou and also plays host to an outdoor kitchen and a saltwater pool.
Here’s the playhouse’s living room and upstairs, followed by a tour of the rest of the digs:
Playmates
- 36 Tiel Way [HAR]
The above corner of Welch and Revere streets, which currently holds the 2-story River Oaks Manor condo complex, looks to be trading up for a much taller occupant: a 9-story condo midrise going by the name The Revere at River Oaks. A 6-story condo midrise project called Revere Park was previously planned at the corner of Mimosa and Revere, one block to the south; that project was denied several variance requests by the city last year, with objecting residents claiming the area couldn’t handle increased density.
River Oaks Manor (which is itself outside the boundaries of River Oaks) sits on a narrow rhomboidal lot to the southeast of the intersection; the building footprint’s slightly acute and obtuse angles are complemented by sets of triangular windows on several corner units. Kirksey Architecture’s design for the proposed midrise structure seems to stick more firmly rectilinear shapes, however:
Avalon Place
- 2322 Persa St. [HAR]
The walls and roof of the former Walgreen’s at 3900 Westheimer Rd. are now being teased apart into the tangle above, following the issuance last week of a demolition permit for the 1975 structure. River Oaks Baptist School bought the property in April of last year, around the time Walgreen’s jumped eastward across the intersection of Westheimer and Weslayan/Willowick to inhabit the former Fresh Market space (where it now operates next to what turned out to be a Texas Emergency Care Center neighboring the River Oaks branch of Mattress Firm).
Here’s another angle on the teardown, with the 1963 Willowick Condominiums tower peeking over the scene in the background:
Born Again in Highland Village
- 3616 Ella Lee Ln. [HAR]
The Panera marker previously spotted all by its lonesome in the leasing flier for Braun Enterprises’ redevelopment of 1705 W. Gray has picked up a companion in the form of the Kriser’s Natural Pet logo. The marker for the grain-averse pet supply and grooming store now appears on the freestanding former home of International Hair Salon & Nail Spa (shown above), previously marked up in Braun’s renderings as a possible coffee shop.Â
The reader who snagged the shot above also spent some time sniffing around the back and sides of the complex (to be known as the River Oaks Collection). The wall in the shot below is starting to get its coat of grey paint cleaned off to match the mottled brick exterior shown in the redo renderings:
River Oaks Collecting
Here’s a look at renderings of redeveloper Braun Enterprises‘s plans for some of its holdings just east of the intersection of W. Gray St. with Dunlavy down the street from the River Oaks shopping Center. The view above shows preliminary plans for the makeover of 1705 W. Gray St., which has also been collecting various light building and demo permits issued for the past few months.
The drawings currently on Braun’s leasing fliers (dubbing the center the River Oaks Collection) shows a Panera Bread settled in at the corner once occupied by Zephyr Hair and Chateau Grooming. Other potential future businesses are depicted in a more minimalist manner; the words books and boutique appear on the second floor space previously housing Passport, Photo & Visa Service Center, while salon and restaurant fill out the ground floor offerings.
Below is a site plan of the center, including the freestanding former home of International Hair Salon & Nail Spa, on the right across a driveway:
Brauning on W. Gray
A more permanent fence has taken over for the one previously wrapped around the lot at 3482 Inwood Dr., where possibly-murdered apartment tycoon and singer Harold Farb was midway through building a house for himself and his wife at the time of his death in 2006. The property initially hit the market partial-house-and-all, with the expectation that future buyers could finish up the construction of a 17,404-sq.-ft. estate overlooking the River Oaks Country Club’s golf course. After a steady price decay from $14.75 million to about $10 million by mid-2010, tactics changed; the property got a demo permit and a subsequent smoothing over, and was relisted in October of 2012 (and again in December of 2014, then to the tune of just under $9 million).
The fully re-undeveloped land hit the market again last Thursday, now for $8.5 million, Here’s the current view of the front gate, and what’s inside it:
Green in River Oaks
