Checking in from a window seat at the Luby’s on South Post Oak, Swamplot correspondent Aaron Carpenter keeps close to the slasher action now playing on all 16 demolished screens of the AMC Meyer Park Theater. As Swamplot noted last week, a new Kohl’s will be built at the shopping center after the theater drops its final curtain. Also coming to the Meyer Park center, according to reports from the scene: a brand new standalone Luby’s. The one that’s there now will be torn down.
A quick 3 and out this try: 2 homes leave the Heights, plus a fond memory of Memorial Valley.
The City of Houston permitting office has worked its artistic magic: There’s a house now sitting on the lot at 3705 Lyons Ave. in the Fifth Ward that’s officially classified as a sculpture. Last week, it was just a run-down bungalow a couple of miles to the northwest, at 3012 Erastus St. At what point along its journey — which after several postponements finally took place last Thursday night — did the transformation occur? City officials and demo artists Dan Havel and Dean Ruck can’t pinpoint it. But we’ve got a few photos of the move. Maybe someone can point out for us the exact moment the art began?
I’m going to give you a little advice. There’s a force in the universe that makes things happen. And all you have to do is get in touch with it, stop thinking, let things happen . . .
Swamplot’s Daily Demolition Report lists buildings that received City of Houston demolition permits the previous weekday.
Five different flavors from McIlhenny. Is this just a matter of taste?
Back in August, Swamplot noted that a demolition permit had been purchased for the home at 306 E. Friar Tuck, the notable former estate of strip-mall king Jerry J. Moore. Moore’s chateau was a true Houston-style original. In other words, it wasn’t your usual pretentious imitation of some old building style from some faraway country; instead, it was an imitation at least reputed to have included actual original old French building parts transported from across centuries and an ocean or 2 to Houston, and reassembled here with great care and some semblance of appropriateness. All of which has over the years allowed the entire assemblage to gain a certain authenticity — you know, in that uniquely Houston way.
Moore died in 2008. In May of this year the home was sold at a much-discounted price of $3.75 million to — appropriately enough — the CEO of a firm that helps other companies outsource their business processes. But three months later, after the property popped up in the Daily Demolition Report, Swamplot was unable to confirm the extent of the planned demo. Sure, work was already taking place on-site, but the permit was broad, and different sources were providing incomplete and contradictory information about whether the new owner planned to demolish all, some, or simply minor portions of the structures on the lot. Now, the dust has cleared enough to give us a partial answer.
Count one fewer structure honoring the first African American to win the Navy Cross.
AMC’s Meyer Park 16 movie theater isn’t listed on the demo permit, but its address is. But will the new Kohl’s be open in time for the Oscars?
Late Update, 12/16: The implosions are back on, scheduled for December 19th.
Update, 12/8 3:30 pm: FortBendNow is reporting that this weekend’s implosion has been canceled and will be rescheduled later.
Fort Bend County fans of large building implosions won’t have to drive all the way into Downtown Houston to watch the next big boom. It’s gonna be taking place right in the heart of Sugar Land, this weekend! Johnson Development Corp. will be knocking down an old furnace house and a bin building — 2 metal structures from the former Imperial Sugar Refinery — this Sunday morning at 7. The ongoing demolition project is necessary so the company — part of a public-private partnership with the Texas General Land Office and the City of Sugar Land, run by private equity firm Cherokee — can create a giant historic-themed development on the surrounding industrial acreage, celebrating the area’s rich history of refinement. The Imperial Sugar Company, no stranger to refinery explosions itself, shut down the plant in 2003.
Something’s grinding to a halt at the former home of Crime Stoppers:
Note: Nope, not tonight. See update below.
Sometime after 9 pm tonight — if rain doesn’t postpone its scheduled journey from 3012 Erastus St. in Houston’s Fifth Ward to a new home on Lyons Ave. — this abandoned house will become art. That’s not just the contention of Dan Havel and Dean Ruck, the two demolition artists responsible for the move; it’s actually detailed in the city permits they obtained for “Fifth Ward Jam,” a temporary public-art project they’re creating with funding from the Houston Arts Alliance. After Wooten House Movers set up the structure in its new location, Havel and Ruck will start tearing it up and reconstructing it. But the move is what will make it art — because the city says so. “The permit office had a hard time categorizing just exactly what to call our project,” Havel tells Swamplot:
Is it a house, is it a sculpture? Is it both? The black and white rules of permitting needed to be utilized. The best way to do that is to first call the house a structure in order to obtain the permits to move it. However, once the house is placed on the property, it ceases to be an inhabitable structure and will be transformed into a sculptural environment. So, somewhere along the moving route, whether it is half way between two sites or when it physically enters the new site, it will be officially categorized as a sculpture.
So when we reconstruct the house into a sculpture, we do not need a building permit because it is now a sculpture. Pretty funny logic, if you ask me, but it makes sense. The permit guys were certainly scratching their heads, but we got our permits.
Just what is there left to clear on the corner lot next to Little Woodrow’s in Midtown? Plus: a garage in Sunnyside and single-story in South Park get the boot.
Residences
Swamplot’s Daily Demolition Report lists buildings that received City of Houston demolition permits the previous weekday.
Making a second or late appearance on the city’s permit report: a block of the Katy Freeway cleared several years ago.
A 28-story long-abandoned see-through Downtown hotel demolished for the views — but: the underground parking will be spared. (Phew!) Also: finishing off the Ella Square Apartments, and no more swimming at Candlelight Trails.
A sizable chunk of a just-north-of-610 apartment complex crashes to the ground, along with some littler residences scattered about town:
