Tag: Adaptive Reuse

Featured Posts
01/16/18 1:30pm

Heights Vinyl Skipping Out of the Heights

by
Houston Heights, Openings and Closings
5 Comments

Heights Vinyl is getting ready to box up its collection of grooved disks, turntables, and other analog audio items before bolting from the building it shares with Cat Veterinary Clinic at 3122 White Oak Dr. (The record store’s former neighbor and industry peer — 3mA Audio — moved out of the space directly next to the vet’s office last year.) Last April, an entity connected to developer Ancorian bought the 8,900-sq.-ft. strip — as well as the adjacent apartment building at 3110 White Oak.

On Sunday, Heights Vinyl announced via Facebook that it would be moving to a Fifth Ward warehouse building south of I-10 at 3301 Cline St. That building is divided into 2 tenant spaces — Heights Vinyl will take over the one shown below, fronting the parking lot along Grove St.:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Fifth Ward Bound
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
12/14/17 12:45pm

The First New Tenant in 7800 Washington’s Warehouse Redo Won’t Hang Around for Long

by
Openings and Closings
No Comments

The former packaging warehouse at 7800 Washington — on its way to being reworked so that offices, furniture showrooms, and a restaurant can move into it, likely next year — already has a new tenant in place: The Study, a pop-up gallery and shop selling prints, greeting cards, and design-y gifts. Los Angeles-based artist Jacqueline Levine runs the store, which opened late last month in the southeast corner of the 66,000-sq.-ft. building.

Levine’s father, Larry Levine, is hoping a restaurant will take over the space once more of the building is ready for tenants. He’s the president of Levcor, the development firm that bought the building last year. The Study will be open through January, although it’ll take some holiday time off beginning on December 24.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

The Study
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
12/12/17 3:30pm

8 Letters and a Big Eye Spell Out the Beginnings of Washington Ave Warehouse’s Transformation

by
1 Comment

Study the photo at top carefully and you’ll see 2 eye-catching features that were installed in November: the gaping, cycloptic sculpture at the entrance to the parking lot outside 7800 Washington, as well as new lettering spelling out THE STUDY on the warehouse’s awning. Developer Levcor bought the 66,000-sq.-ft. brick building — at that time home to Brian Thomas Display & Packaging — last year and filed construction permits in September to begin renovating it into a space for offices, furniture showrooms, and a restaurant.

Before and after views show how the building’s front side on Washington, just northwest of the Katy Fwy., will be transformed:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Cottage Grove
, , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
12/06/17 3:15pm

Warehouse Removal Project Begins on Commerce St., Where the Block Will Extend to Canal

by
Demolitions, Mixed Use, Redevelopment, Second Ward
2 Comments

A Swamplot reader sends photos of the partial demolition now underway along Commerce St. just off Colby in the Second Ward just north of East Downtown. Ancorian bought 3 warehouses between Commerce and Canal St. last November and plans to redevelop the site into a single dock-front building with a parking lot along its west side. The new development, dubbed The Block, would consist of 44,000 sq. ft. of “creative workspace and retail.”

Here’s an aerial view looking west along Commerce St taken from before the demolition.:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Second Ward Redo
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
12/01/17 1:30pm

Alterations Begin on McGowen Cleaners, Soon To Be Vibrant

by
Hyde Park, Renovations
2 Comments

Work has begun outside the former McGowen Cleaners — closed since 2015 — on the corner of Fairview and Morse streets, the site of the planned Vibrant restaurant. Last May, Vibrant’s owners bought the 3,909-sq.-ft. brick building, along with 2 adjacent neighbors to the south; they plan to open their Lake Flato-designed restaurant inside the corner building in March. The above rendering shows a patio that would be cut into its corner — and a garden lining the street, where chunks of chopped-up pavement now lie.

The rendering also shows tall windows being created where clerestory windows currently face Fairview. The clerestories are visible in the center of this photo of the 1931 Fairview St. building from last year, when the property was up for sale:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Lake Flato in Hyde Park
, , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
11/13/17 4:00pm

Post-Retirement Plan for Montalbano Tire: Restaurant, Retail, Offices

by
First Ward, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments
6 Comments

Here’s what’s expected to park in the garage at Montalbano Tire and Auto Service after the business shuts down next week: a restaurant or 2, retailers, and office tenants. Kaldis Development Interests purchased the .81-acre property at 1302 Houston Ave in mid-October and plans to renovate it before reopening it as a 15,000-sq.-ft. retail-and-office center.

On the Houston Ave front (see top drawing), windows would be fitted into the building’s current garage bays, with a restaurant patio facing the street at the northern end. On the south side, the metal structure facing Dart St. would be punctured with new window bays as well as doors for individual storefronts.

According to the site plan for the proposed new development (below) 7 head-in parking spaces off of Houston Ave would remain after the redo:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

First Ward Redo
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
11/08/17 3:15pm

New Stomping Grounds on 34th St. Will Make Former Industrial Buildings Next to Slowpokes Shine

by
Garden Oaks, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments
4 Comments

Coming soon to the complex of light-colored industrial buildings across 34th St. from the Pat H. Foley funeral home and its accompanying embalming services facility, the Hare Krishna Temple and Cultural Center, and the Foster Family YMCA between them just south of Oak Forest: a 17,831 sq.-ft. retail and restaurant center redo. Revive Development’s Stomping Grounds, which will also include 5,000 sq. ft. of upstairs office space, is to be carved out of 4 buildings on a 3-acre site formerly occupied by vehicle-repair and service companies and the Bank Shot pool hall.

Drawings from Cisneros Design Studio show the 2-story metal building at 1229 W. 34th St. (pictured above) formerly occupied by a succession of electrical companies cleaned up, reconfigured, and outfitted with cantilevered balconies and glass curtain walls. A new building modeled after it is shown to the east, with an 8,000 sq.-ft. lawn bordered by patios fitted between.

224 parking spaces will surround the center’s main buildings and garden. Here’s a plan of the entire site:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Garden Oaks, Oak Forest, or Thereabouts
, , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
11/02/17 4:45pm

The Truck-Repair-to-Brewery Transformation Coming to North Shepherd

by
Industrial Properties, Shepherd Park Plaza
4 Comments

The former North Shepherd Dr. garage of Southern Truck Pros, an auto shop that specializes in diesel trucks, appears to be headed for a second career — as a brewery. The Facebook page for a new company called Astral Brewing, showing off the kick-the-can logo portrayed here, lists 4818 N. Shepherd Dr. as its address — with a projected landing in 2018.

Until this past February, that address served as the Southern Truck Pros HQ. The metal warehouse building sits across the street from pickled pork rib tip hotspot B&W Meat Co., on the eastern edge of Shepherd Park Plaza.

Southern Truck Pros’ new location is further north, at 11549 Brooklyn St., east of the Hardy Toll Rd.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , ,
Adaptive Reuse
10/04/17 2:30pm

Rem Koolhaas and OMA’s Big Plans To Remake Houston’s Central Post Office into a Major Downtown Farming, Shopping, Eating, and 3-D Printing Hub

by
Attractions, Downtown, Mixed Use, Proposed Developments, Redevelopment, Theater District
16 Comments

Update, 6 pm: At the request of Lovett Commercial, the company’s renderings of this project originally included in this story have been removed.

Hadn’t heard that Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas and his Office for Metropolitan Architecture have been designing the massive redo planned for the 16-acre campus around Houston’s shuttered Barbara Jordan Post Office at 401 Franklin St. Downtown? Or that the project’s owner and developer, Lovett Commercial, is boasting that the 530,000-sq.-ft. redevelopment, on a site along Buffalo Bayou, will include the world’s largest urban rooftop farming operation, supplying a 40,000-sq.-ft. festival food market below? Maybe that’s because none of this has been officially announced yet.

There’s more to the plans being waved about: apartments, live-work studios, coworking and maker spaces, parks, events venues, a combined 100,000 sq. ft. of indoor and outdoor markets and even a digital library honoring Barbara Jordan. More than just that library is being named after the former post office facility, however: As of last year, the entire venue has been dubbed Post Houston (or Post HTX for sorta-short.) Also, because it’s what comes next for the city — get it?

“Post Houston aims to be a world class creative campus for technology, the arts, culture, and dining,” announces a Lovett Commercial leasing brochure. Here’s a walkthrough of some of the ambitious project’s proposed main features, using images that appear to date from earlier this year:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Post HTX
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
08/17/17 4:45pm

How the New Architecture Center Houston Will Batten Down the Hatches When High Water Comes

by
Downtown, Flooding, Houston Architects, Quicklink, Renovations
5 Comments

HOW THE NEW ARCHITECTURE CENTER HOUSTON WILL BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES WHEN HIGH WATER COMES What’s going to happen to the new exhibition, meeting, and office spaces at the Architecture Center Houston — set to reopen next month in its new location in the ground floor and former boiler room of the 1906 B.A. Riesner Building at 900 Commerce St., next to the Bayou Lofts and across from the Spaghetti Warehouse Downtown — in the very likely event that floodwaters rise from nearby Buffalo Bayou? Kyle Humphries of Murphy Mears Architects, the firm chosen to lead the reconfiguration of the space after a competition last year, tells the Architect’s Newspaper’s Jason Sayer that the designers imagined the interior as a bathtub, and accordingly wrapped a quarter-inch-thick plate made of aluminum around the interior on 2 sides: “’Our storefront system that faces Commerce Street is sealed and uses structural steel panels up to 3.5 feet long all along that facade,’ described Humphries. Furthermore, custom fills and seals on the doors (the profiles of which were manufactured in Switzerland) were prescribed with a custom-designed drop-in flood panel that can be operated by one person standing outside.” [The Architect’s Newspaper] Video walkthrough: Murphy Mears Architects

, , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
08/16/17 3:00pm

What’s Ahead for Greenspoint Mall: Truck Stop, Restaurant Distribution Warehouse, Construction Materials Storage, More Arguments

by
Buying and Selling, Malls, Neighborhood Disputes
5 Comments

The broker representing the new and prospective owners of the shuttered Macy’s and Dillard’s buildings at Greenspoint Mall gives just a hint of the rancor between the groups who now appear to be negotiating the mall’s future: Maddox Properties’ Jim Maddox tells Bisnow’s Kyle Hagerty that any supposed redevelopment plans hinted at by the investment group led by Chinese developer Feng Gao that now has the mall itself under contract are “full of sh*t.” [Hagerty’s punctuation.] Maddox says he hung up the phone on area Chamber of Commerce prez and mall redevelopment partner Reggie Gray after Gray complained to him that plans in place by the owners of the retired department store buildings would ruin redevelopment plans for the area.

About those plans: Spring Real Estate Investment’s Zulfiqar Karedia, Hagerty reports, is seeking to develop a truck stop on a 4-acre portion of its newly purchased Macy’s property fronting I-45. Maddox says a restaurant distribution business is slated to take over the Dillard’s property in the mall’s southwest corner — after a sale he brokered last week closes in September.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Full of It
, , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
08/10/17 1:15pm

How To Design a Parking Garage That Won’t Become Useless Once Cars Get Restless

by
Parking, Quicklink
6 Comments

HOW TO DESIGN A PARKING GARAGE THAT WON’T BECOME USELESS ONCE CARS GET RESTLESS The best way to make sure parking garages don’t become obsolete heaps of concrete once cars figure out better things to do with their time when drivers aren’t using them is to build structures that have flat floorplates and more headroom, Gensler’s Peter Merwin tells reporter Kyle Hagerty: “Any future use will require level ground rather than the steep slopes typical to garages, so designing flat floors on every level is critical. To convert to residential, developers need a minimum 11-foot floor-to-floor height. That allows designers to properly core the infrastructure and build out the space.” Merwin, who works in Gensler’s Houston office, is guiding the design of the proposed Fairview District Garage at Fairview and Genesee streets in Montrose. His ideal future-proofing floor-to-floor dimension for garages as we approach the age of the driverless car? 15 ft. “That opens up the option to convert each floor into lofts, residential, retail or office. Another added benefit is that in the event you need more parking, not less, you can convert a 15-foot level into a double stacking parking floor like those in operation in many dense metros.” [Bisnow] Rendering of Fairview District Garage: Gensler

, ,
Adaptive Reuse
08/09/17 1:00pm

Where Houston’s First Virtual Reality Bar Will Exist in Meatspace

by
Bars and Clubs, East End, Proposed Developments
5 Comments

The new bar planned for the 20,878-sq.-ft. warehouse at 3229 Navigation Blvd. in Houston’s East End that earlier this decade was home to Fred’s Trailer Truck Supply will be called Straylight Run and serve — according to its promoters — as Houston’s first-ever “Virtual Reality Bar.” That’s the conclusion of some internet sleuthing by HAIF (and Swamplot) commenter CrockpotandGravel, who after seeing Swamplot’s report on the alcohol license procured for the spot at the corner of Navigation and Engelke tracked down the establishment’s website, a (possibly spurned) logo proposal, and Instagram feed.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

Straylight Run on Navigation
, , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
07/28/17 3:45pm

What’s Behind the Bacco North Braeswood Backup

by
Braeswood Place, Restaurants
9 Comments

All construction work appears to have stopped, a reader notes, on the transformation of the former Pilgrim Cleaners and (later) Shriners Hospital clothing donation drop-off building at 4005 N. Braeswood into a second location of the Bacco wine bar. (The building, at the corner of Stella Link, backs up to Brays Bayou.) A red tag from city’s floodplain management office sticky-noted to the window beside the front door and dated July 3 gives a hint as to why: “Remodeling without floodplain permit in the floodplain,” it reads. On the next line, it adds another bit of advice: “Need electrical, plumbing, and structural permits as well.”

Photo: Swamplot inbox

When It Pours
, , , , , ,
Adaptive Reuse
07/14/17 5:30pm

The Wheels Are Off at This Oak Forest Tire Kiosk Transitioning to a Coffee Drive-Thru

by
Garden Oaks, Oak Forest, Proposed Developments, Renovations
1 Comment

Here’s a view from last week of the former Express Wheel & Tire kiosk in Oak Forest, in the midst of its transformation into a yet-to-be-identified coffee drive-thru along Ella Blvd. at W. 34th St., at the eastern end of the shopping center redo Revive Development is working on at that intersection’s southwest corner. Demo crews are removing the overhang connecting the front canopy to the small building behind it. Renderings of the finished development on the Revive website show the canopy is meant to remain — to shade a few prime parking spaces at the eastern end of the development:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

W. 34th St. and Ella
, , , , ,
« Previous Page Next Page »