Tag: Institutional Buildings

Institutional Buildings
07/29/09 4:39pm

New Physics Building at Rice: Fifties Courtyard Block

by
New Construction, Rice University
13 Comments

Why is it so hard to get a definitive image of Rice’s new physics building? There’s no real uncertainty about it — it’s already under construction. It’s just that the thing is going in so close to its neighbors it’s hard to find a good angle for a solo portrait.

The Brockman Hall for Physics, funded in part by $11.1 million of — yes, stimulus money doled out by the National Institute of Standards and Technology — and designed by Philadelphia architects KieranTimberlake, will plug up an unnamed courtyard on the fifties-and-science-themed north part of the campus.

Here’s a rendering showing the 110,000 sq.-ft. building blocking the path between the legs and through the open portal of 17-year-old George R. Brown Hall:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , ,
Downtown
07/24/09 11:43am

Places, Everyone! Houston Ballet Center for Dance Starts Digging in Downtown

by
Houston Architects, Institutional Buildings, New Construction, Proposed Developments, Theater District
3 Comments

Shhhh!!! The curtain hasn’t gone up yet on the new Center for Dance the Houston Ballet is constructing at 601 Preston St., between Louisiana and Smith, at the northern end of Downtown. There have been no big public announcements about the project, no local news stories, nada. But it looks like preliminary construction work on the building has already begun.

Yes, the new Ballet building is the mystery construction project Abc13 reporter Miya Shay posted in her Twitter feed yesterday, prompting an impromptu guessing game here. After some smart guesses from Swamplot readers and Tweeters, Shay revealed the answer this morning. In a later tweet, she gave a few more details: that fundraising for the building had reached more than 50 percent of the organization’s goal and that the building’s skybridge — which would connect it directly to the Wortham Center, so performers’ ballet shoes wouldn’t have to touch the street — was “def[initely] in.”

Shay also posted a second photo showing work going on at the construction site:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
Houston Architects
07/10/09 1:19pm

Main Street Theater Reaches the Renovation Stage

by
Institutional Buildings, Leasing, Proposed Developments, Rice Viillage
2 Comments

Main Street Theater’s lease on its Rice Village building — which it’s held for 27 years — went month-to-month last year. So the 34-year-old company has announced it wants to buy and renovate the building at 2540 Times Blvd., near Kirby. (The theater also stages productions at a separate facility in Chelsea Market, at 4617 Montrose Blvd.)

This dramatically lit rendering from Studio Red Architects is meant to attract donors to the organization’s $3.5 million capital campaign. It shows what a theater-owned and renovated building might look like shortly before an evening performance — if, say, no one decided to park in front of it.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
Demolitions
06/10/09 12:15pm

Transubstantiation for Augustine on Graustark

by
Institutional Buildings, Montrose, University of St. Thomas
No Comments

A Swamplot correspondent, concerned that readers of this site

so often have “before” and “after” photos, but rarely a “during”

sends in these action shots from this morning, showing the demolition-in-progress of the University of St. Thomas’s Augustine Living-Learning Community at 4119 Graustark.

UST’s news department reports that the building’s destruction will at last allow the liberation of the programs formerly sequestered within:

. . . the heart of the Living-Learning Community, an intensive experience in the integration of faith, academics and life, will continue to beat in a program bearing a new name – Augustine-Without-Walls.

“The name signifies more than the removal of the residence’s brick exterior: the program will now be open to all UST students who want to share in Augustine events, which focus on integrating academic learning with faith convictions and real everyday life,” said Sister Paula Jean Miller, FSE, Augustine-Without-Walls Program director.

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , ,
Eminent Domain
02/24/09 10:02am

HISD Neighborhood Lunch Program: The Eating of Glenbrook Valley

by
Glenbrook Valley, Institutional Buildings, Proposed Developments, Schools
14 Comments

In a letter demonstrating the virtues of direct and forthright language, HISD has notified the owners of 8 homes on Glenloch St. in Glenbrook Valley that the new Lewis Elementary School will eat up their property:

This letter is to inform you that growth in Houston has created a serious shortage of permanent space within the Houston Independent School District (“HISD”). In a response to this need for space necessary to provide the best education for our children in your area, HISD will be replacing the Lewis Elementary School facility and it will be necessary to expand the existing school site.

The Superintendent of Schools has recommended, and the HISD Board of Education has designated, a tract of land for this expansion. This tract includes property you may own (see attached map).

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
Art
02/02/09 10:21am

The Richmond Lights Shall Not Be Moved

by
Institutional Buildings, Menil, Proposed Developments, Quicklink, Redevelopment
No Comments

THE RICHMOND LIGHTS SHALL NOT BE MOVED Deputy director Emily Todd lists the “guiding principles” behind the Menil’s planned expansion for the Chronicle‘s Douglas Britt: “Just going down the list: environmentally sustainable design principles; no alteration to the original museum buildings or the Cy Twombly (Gallery); the Dan Flavin/Richmond Hall installation cannot be relocated. … The relationship between the Menil buildings to the Rothko (Chapel) and the Byanztine Chapel have to be taken into account – something that is so beautiful. The … scale, ambience and residential quality of the neighborhood is of paramount importance, which I think is sweet. Any new buildings in the immediate vicinity of the president buildings will be of the scale of the Cy Twombly Gallery. Significant trees will be preserved, and building on an outdoor environment that encourages visitors and especially families, which you see if you come over here on the weekends.” [Arts in Houston; previously in Swamplot]

, , , , , , ,
Buying and Selling
01/30/09 11:46am

Spur 5 Hop: The University of Houston Grows East

by
Commercial Real Estate, Industrial Properties, Institutional Buildings, Office Space, University of Houston
14 Comments

The University of Houston has been given the go-ahead by the system’s Board of Regents to negotiate the purchase of the University Business Park, the 69-acre former Schlumberger Technologies corporate headquarters complex that faces I-45 South, just east of UH’s central campus.

The university currently leases 150,000 square feet in the business park, for offices “and other uses.” The new campus extension would be used for academic and research programs, administrative offices, storage, “industry partnerships,” and other functions. And it comes with 30 acres of vacant land.

UH has already completed the purchase of an adjacent 5-acre site, for about $2.5 million:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
Art
01/27/09 10:56am

What the New Collection of Menil Collections Might Look Like

by
Cherryhurst, Institutional Buildings, Menil, Proposed Developments, Redevelopment
16 Comments

The firm of British architect David Chipperfield has been selected to design a master plan for the expansion of the Menil Collection campus. What’s to be added?

Those facilities include the Menil Drawing Institute and Study Center, an auditorium, a café, additional space for Menil archives and buildings devoted to the work of individual artists.

The Menil Foundation is also interested in developing “income-producing properties” along the coming Richmond rail line, reports Douglas Britt in the Houston Chronicle.

Fitting in so many new buildings, of course, will be a lot easier once the Menil decides which of its many neighboring properties it wants to knock down. And owning 30 acres in the area means there are plenty of possibilities!

Which will go first? The gray-washed arts bungalows? The small rental properties? Richmond Hall? Richmont Square?

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , , , ,
Downtown
12/12/08 2:48pm

New Houston Ballet Building: Maybe Not

by
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:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , ,
Downtown
12/03/08 1:56pm

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

by
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:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , ,
Art
11/24/08 10:25am

More Images of the Asia Society Headquarters Design

by
Institutional Buildings, Museum District, New Construction, Proposed Developments
2 Comments

Now available on the Asia Society website, amid pix of dragon dancers and Yao Ming shoveling dirt at the groundbreaking last spring: 2 more renderings of architect Yoshio Taniguchi’s design for the society’s new 38,000-sq.-ft. Texas Center in the Museum District.

The view from Southmore St. at Caroline, in 2010:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , ,
Downtown
11/07/08 10:53am

Downtown Waiting Room

by
Institutional Buildings, Quicklink
3 Comments

DOWNTOWN WAITING ROOM Architect Lawrence Speck of Page Southerland Page, architect of the Christ Church Cathedral’s John S. Dunn Outreach Center at Prairie and San Jacinto: “We went to other places that were serving the homeless in Houston and spoke with people. Gosh, they have all the time in the world. They’re very happy to talk to you. One thing that we learned that had not been handled well in Austin was that a whole lot of their lives are about waiting. They’re waiting for the meal; they’re waiting for an appointment; they’re waiting for friends to show up; and there’s no place to hang out. They are constantly being moved or jostled. So on the north side of Dunn center, we built a lot of space for just hanging out. There’s a very deep arcade—about 12 feet deep. It’s got ceiling fans. It’s shady. It’s cool. Then there’s a little buffer of green space, which is very, very important because that makes them not feel like they’re on the sidewalk. . . . Another thing that’s good about the arcade is that it’s on the church’s turf, and so the hotels and the condos and the other office buildings down there feel much more comfortable with the homeless people being in their neighborhood than they did before.” [Architectural Record]

, , ,
Downtown
11/06/08 12:20pm

Alamo or Modern: Which Way for the San Jose?

by
Institutional Buildings, Medical Buildings, Midtown, Proposed Developments
No Comments

Rendering of Proposed Family Health Center, 2615 Fannin St. at McGowen St., Houston

The Christus Foundation for HealthCare appears to be hawking two distinct visions for the family health center it hopes to build at the corner of Fannin and McGowen in Midtown. That’s the same location where the complex that contained the Fu Kim Grand Palace Restaurant was torn down last year. On fundraising materials for the San José Clinic — a charity clinic that currently operates across the street from Minute Maid Park Downtown, and which will move into the new center in Midtown when it’s completed in 2010 — there’s a rendering of what looks like a 3-story stucco Alamo-meets-UT mini-resort building set behind a parking lot.

But the Christus Foundation’s website features something entirely different on its Living the Legacy fundraising page:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
Commercial Real Estate
09/10/08 11:41am

Abortion and Real Estate Protests

by
Institutional Buildings, Medical Buildings, Neighborhood Disputes, Renovations, University of Houston
No Comments

Changes are coming to that stair-stepped, slit-windowed office building on the south side of the Gulf Freeway just south of Lockwood and Elgin, recently vacated by Sterling Bank. It will soon have a whole lot more glass — and become Planned Parenthood’s local administrative headquarters:

Peter Durkin, president of Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas, said the new building will be big: six stories and 75,000 square feet. He described the claim that the building will be the largest center of late-term abortions in the Western Hemisphere as “nonsense.”

Only one of the six floors will be for clinical space, he said. Most of the building, he said, will be used for administration and family planning.

Renovations on the former Sterling Bank building on the Gulf Freeway near the University of Houston will begin in November, and Planned Parenthood likely will relocate in early 2010.

A “conceptual drawing” of the renovated building . . . after the jump:

CONTINUE READING THIS STORY

, , , , , ,
« Previous Page Next Page »