Tag: Houston Architects

Downtown
12/12/08 2:48pm

New Houston Ballet Building: Maybe Not

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Houston Architects, Institutional Buildings, Proposed Developments, Theater District
1 Comment

It’s been obvious for some time that economic conditions and credit problems have placed a giant question mark next to almost every major proposed new development in town. But it sure is fun to revisit them one by one!

A week after Swamplot posted renderings of the new building the Houston Ballet has been planning for a Downtown block near the Wortham Center it bought last year, the Houston Press‘s Richard Connelly made some inquiries with Houston Ballet PR manager Melissa Carroll about the building. In reply came this very brief message:

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Homes for Sale
12/10/08 5:35pm

Would Lars Bang Have Recognized This One?

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Houston Architects, Landscape, Memorial Bend, Real Estate Marketing, Renovations
4 Comments

From HAIF, a brief but classic conversation from earlier this week about the house for sale at 423 Electra in Memorial Bend:

Has anyone been inside this house lately? The realtor seems to be a little confused in the HAR listing. It reads that it is 2 bed from 3, has 6 bathrooms, a garage and a manned gate?? well I guess the fence and gate was put in by a man. And its a “absolutely gorgeous must see” and also sold for “lot value”. huh? My biggest question is what’s with that front yard nursery plantings?

Is the house re-muddled too far?

The response, after the jump — from someone who’s been there. Plus: all the remaining photos from the listing!

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Downtown
12/03/08 1:56pm

Dance, Building, Dance: Houston Ballet Makes a Downtown Debut

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Houston Architects, Institutional Buildings, Proposed Developments, Theater District
5 Comments

What’s the Houston Ballet’s new $53 million, 120,000-sq.-ft. Downtown headquarters building going to look like? Two renderings of the 6-story building planned for the block between Smith, Louisiana, Congress, and Preston Sts. have appeared on an architecture website based in the U.K.

A connecting skybridge would prevent tutus from wilting on the long journey between the new ballet practice facilities and the Wortham Center, which is catty-corner to the site. The new building will also house the ballet’s offices and wardrobe shop, as well as the the Ben Stevenson Academy.

The two views of the building don’t exactly gibe — a likely sign that the design is not final:

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Houston Architects
11/19/08 4:50pm

Outsourcing Turnaround

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Stunned by a telephone call, a Swamplot correspondent who works for a small Houston architecture firm weighs in on the latest turn in the U.S. construction downturn:

For the last few years, our firm has been hit up pretty regularly by agencies trying to get us to outsource our CAD drawing or 3D rendering work to some low cost labor pool in India, where they can supposedly do everything our employees do for much cheaper. So I was a bit surprised to get a call yesterday from one of these agencies based out of Chicago that went a little different than what I expected.

When I told the caller, who had an Indian accent, that we didn’t have any work to outsource, he said that wasn’t what he was calling about. He said he was working with developers in India as well as Dubai, Bahrain, and a number of other middle eastern countries I had never heard of and wanted to know if my firm wanted to get work from them. Obviously there’s nothing new about working for international clients, but coming from one of these agencies it definitely felt like a moment where flows in the global outsourcing pipeline had suddenly stopped and were now ready to start moving in reverse.

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Home Decor
11/17/08 10:31am

Katy Does Contemporary Country: More Pix of that House on Woods Lane

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Homes for Sale, Houston Architects, Interiors, Katy, Uncategorized
3 Comments

Readers obsessed with the Katy house designed by Wylie W. Vale that was featured in last week’s Neighborhood Guessing Game will be interested to see these additional views of the 1952 home — in all its original “little bit country, little bit Mod” glory. They were taken by architectural photographer (and yes, game winner) Ben Hill on a quick visit early last year.

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Home Decor
11/13/08 5:54pm

Neighborhood Guessing Game Over: Contemporary Country

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Homes for Sale, Houston Architects, Interiors, Katy, Neighborhood Guessing Game
2 Comments

Neighborhood Guessing Game 32: Office

Just what was it that made this week’s Neighborhood Guessing Game the most popular ever? Carol tries to explain:

It’s not just the cool mod furniture and decorations, or the funky taxidermy room. Maybe it’s that the house looks like the family was so much fun. Maybe it represents the family we all want to go home to on holidays, when Grandma pulls out the Betty Crocker cookbook and makes the greatest stuffing ever and Grandpa tells his hunting stories for the thousandth time. Maybe this was the real American middle class dream of the 1950s. Cue the violins and the teardrop. I second the call for a field trip. Realtor: Please schedule an open house!

Here were your guesses: Garden Oaks, Garden Oaks near Shepherd, Spring Branch (3 votes), Sharpstown (2 votes), Meyerland (2), off Braeswood near the Braeburn Country Club, Bellaire, Garden Villas (2), Braeswood, Glenbrook Valley (2), Spring Valley, Willowbend, Linkwood (2), Memorial Bend, South Braeswood near Stella Link, Tanglewood, Memorial (3), Hunters Creek, Pasadena (3), Meadowcreek, Allendale, Mount Vernon, Ayrshire, Piney Point, Katy, Braeswood (2), South Houston, East Harris County, Deer Park, Baytown, Memorial Villages (3), Marilyn Estates, “Briargrove, or one of those Briar places,” off Briar Forest inside the Beltway, Willow Meadows, Riverside Terrace, between Spring Valley and Hedwig Village, Lake Jackson (2), Texas City, Mt. Pleasant, Creekside, Tynewood, Westbury, and Park Place.

How far are you willing to travel for that open house?

The winner was BenH, who in accordance with rule 3 “guessed” Katy. He’s visited the house, but deserves credit for reporting about it on HAIF last week (shortly before another reader wrote to Swamplot with the suggestion). He says the photos don’t do it justice.

Many fine and original comments this week! Honorable mentions go to JT, for some never-mind-the-carbon dating (but what if the home truly was ahead of its time?):

The house is definitely in the 1954-1958 era with the pale yellow kitchen tile counters and the MCM signature pink adobe brick being the telltale. Mrs. Matron loved her draperies but, Lord, can anyone open them up? It looks like some prime windows are hidden.

and Jessica, for expressing the spirit of many in the group, before outing herself as one of those crazed, antler-worthy fans:

You might not want to post the address of this place – I fear the homeowner might be fighting hopeful furniture buyers off with a stick! (Or a pair of antlers – plenty of those handy.) I am totally obsessed with this house, and would also like to see what’s inside the kitchen cabinets!

Eager to have a better look at this house yourself? Here’s some more detail:

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Homebuying
10/30/08 2:25pm

Row House Duplexes: 60 Percent Occupied, Back Porches Half Done

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Homes for Lease, Houston Architects, New Construction, Third Ward
1 Comment

Hannah Project Row House CDC Duplexes on Francis St. Under Construction, Third Ward, Houston

Division St. Duplexes Behind Project Row Houses, Third Ward, HoustonRow House CDC has completed a second group of 8 duplexes for low- to moderate-income residents — on Francis St. between Dowling and Live Oak. That’s just north of the growing Third Ward campus of Project Row Houses, the CDC’s sister organization. At least 6 units are still available, reports Robin Foster in the Chronicle:

The units range from 700 to 900 square feet; 10 are family-sized with three bedrooms and 1½ baths and six have two bedrooms and one bath.

[Row House CDC executive director Alain] Lee said funds for the project were stretched to allow the builder to frame-in back porches. If additional money can be found, the porches will be finished as part of a courtyard envisioned for both the new and original housing complexes, he said.

All 16 duplexes were based on designs by students in the Rice Building Workshop at Rice University.

Photo of Francis St. duplexes under construction: Flickr user b2tse; photo of original duplexes along Division St.: Row House CDC

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Green Design and Development
10/29/08 10:32am

Big and Green

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Home Design, Houston Architects, Quicklink
1 Comment

BIG AND GREEN Houston Architect Donna Kacmar rightsizes her client base: “What is our goal here? I once had a client interview me. She wanted to do a green house. I suggested they could combine some of their (rooms). She said, ‘Oh, no, I need 9,000 square feet; I just want it to be very green.’ (Kacmar laughs.) I didn’t get the job.” [Houston Chronicle]

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Financing
10/22/08 12:18pm

Gensler Layoffs

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Houston Architects, Quicklink
4 Comments

GENSLER LAYOFFS A source who may have spent a little too much time with a chainsaw after Hurricane Ike reports on industry conditions: “It is super bad out there right now. Lending has absolutely ground to a halt. Most of my peers have almost zero pipeline beyond existing signed contracts or institutional work (esp. schools). [The Houston office of architecture firm] Gensler had layoffs this past week, though I would call laying off 16 people ‘trimming the dead limbs off the tree.’” [Swamplot inbox]

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Houston Architects
10/21/08 7:46am

Lars Bang, 1921-2008

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Memorial Bend, Meyerland
3 Comments

4815 Braesvalley Dr., Meyerland, Houston, Designed by Architect Lars Bang

Houston architect Lars W. Bang passed away on Friday. He was 87. His firm, Lars Bang Associates, designed many now-classic Midcentury Modern homes in the Houston area, including several in Memorial Bend.

Bang also designed this home at 4815 Braesvalley Dr. in Meyerland. Bang’s poignant 2007 return visit to that address was featured in Swamplot earlier this year.

Memorial services are scheduled for 10 this morning at Forest Park Westheimer, 12800 Westheimer.

Photo of 4815 Braesvalley Dr.: Meg Zoller

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Financing
08/29/08 8:39am

West Loop Nineties Revival Not Getting Enough Love

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Galleria, Highrises, Houston Architects, Office Buildings, Proposed Developments
1 Comment

Proposed Novati Group Office Tower at 1600 West Loop South, Uptown, HoustonThe Houston Business Journal‘s Jennifer Dawson is reporting that the Novati Group’s plan to dust off a 15-year-old Ziegler Cooper design for a 20-story office tower and build it on the West Loop

appears to be in limbo. The deal isn’t dead, but it’s not moving forward.

The problems: finding debt financing . . . and that pre-leasing thing.

Meanwhile, Dawson expects Transwestern to announce details soon on a large new addition to Uptown’s Four Oaks Place — to replace the 24-Hour Fitness on Post Oak Blvd. owned by TIAA-CREF:

The proposed building being called Tower Five at Four Oaks Place is now set to be 30 stories tall, with 525,000 square feet of office space on 22 floors atop a parking garage with roughly 1,500 spaces, says Carleton Riser, head of Transwestern’s development group.

He says the building designed by architectural firm Pickard Chilton could break ground in the first quarter of 2009.

The fact that no tenants have committed to the new building won’t delay construction, Riser says.

Rendering: Ziegler Cooper

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Buying and Selling
06/17/08 5:17pm

Glen Cove Mod: So Much for Freebies

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Houston Architects, Land Sales, Memorial
No Comments

A tipster informs us that the lovely 1.35-acre lot at 6040 Glen Cove in Memorial — which had been languishing on the market for about a year and a half — has finally been bought! The purchaser: County Judge candidate David Mincberg.

And apparently, Mincberg isn’t too interested in that free Talbott Wilson Midcentury Modern home that comes with it.

Photo of 6040 Glen Cove St.: HAR

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Home Design
05/28/08 1:51pm

The Lease You Could Do: Rice Military Tin House

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Homes for Lease, Houston Architects, Rice Military, West End
4 Comments

5421 Dickson St., Rice Military, Houston

Remember when it looked like the entire West End was going to go . . . metal? It was going to be the Tin House District: Hot young architects inserting daring steel-sided homes between ramshackle bungalows . . . with great sensitivity to the sleepy little neighborhood.

Here’s a Rice Military home Natalye Appel designed for Sarah Balinskas in 1992. And it’s for lease! Have a peek inside . . .

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