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2 New Brownstone Style Buildings In Downtown


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The first project is a five unit speculative project but it is NOT under construction. The most expensive unit, the corner unit on Leeland @ San Jacinto, will have over 8,000 square feet of space, a 3 car garage, and a roofdeck with a summer kitchen and heated pool! It's listed at $2,950,000. However, if you read the fine print closely, you will come to find that it actually says the final product will NOT look like the renderings! These are just a "manhattan brownstone" image according to the listing agent.

The second project is called Richey Street townhomes. There are 7 units and they are under construction. The most expensive is $395,000. They are located in the wharehouse district just across the bayou from downtown proper near the Dakota Lofts.

There's another project going up in that same area called Sterrett Street. There are six units and two have been sold. They are in the mid $600s. They are nearing completion and offer these views...

hr1256226-17.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Here's a look at the Sterrett Street project as it begins to near completion. Only 4 units are left to be sold. These are the ones in the mid 600s so I am pleasantly surprised they are moving in this neighborhood. Sends a positive sign to those weary of moving retail into downtown!

hr1256226-23.jpg

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Here's a look at the Sterrett Street project as it begins to near completion. Only 4 units are left to be sold. These are the ones in the mid 600s so I am pleasantly surprised they are moving in this neighborhood. Sends a positive sign to those weary of moving retail into downtown!

hr1256226-23.jpg

Wow. It's beautiful. 600K? It's amazing what a little handsome-ness does for desireability.

It also looks like the Art-Deco revival is underway.

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That does look very nice... It fooled me at first though, I was counting the windows and at first was thinking it was 7 stories tall... but I realized the scaling was weird... It's actually 4 stories with 2 rows of windows on each floor... a little odd but it doesn't look bad.

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Here's a look at the Sterrett Street project as it begins to near completion. Only 4 units are left to be sold. These are the ones in the mid 600s so I am pleasantly surprised they are moving in this neighborhood. Sends a positive sign to those weary of moving retail into downtown!

Both Richey Street and Sterrett are in an area of downtown that might seem a little strange right now, but it will be nice once it gets built up and also once the Buffalo Bayou Master Plan develops the bayou right nearby. I believe this will be part of the already named "Waterview District" so the high prices could be, at least partially, reflecting that.

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I like it better than its rendering but that wasnt too bad either.

renderingexteriorphase1.jpg

Probably my favorite use of beige in awhile. I also like the lamps used on the front columns. Makes me think of a downtown police station. Nice art deco touch.

Oh yeah nice rendered view.

balconyphase1.jpg

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Would anybody think it would be a bad idea for some of these projects to be near or surounding the new urban park near the convention center? I hear they will build midrise condos there anyway. Plus it would fill up some of those parking lots.

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I'm actually disappointed about the Sterrett project. The design is good, but they tore down a fantastic old warehouse to make way for the project. The brick warehouse was probably 5 stories tall,and filled up the entire site. It had a awsome loading dock that surrounded the building, and really helped define the character of the area. If this continues, the "warehouse district" will become the "over-priced townhome district."

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  • 6 months later...

The building that was demolished for the Sterrett Street project was 802 Walnut - on the corner of Sterrett Street and Walnut Street. The building was 4 stories tall with a dry Houston basement, constructed in 1912 as the Patrick Moving and Storage building. This entire development is owned by Bill Lipscomb, a member of GHPA and prior recipient of their Good Brick Award. Bill was instrumental in saving the 1200 Rothwell and 1204/1206 Nance buildings from demolition.

The building that was taken down had been for sale for over a decade. There had been several re-development attempts using the building, but all failed. The building was only 20k SF. The first floor has 13' ceilings, but the ceiling height dropped to less than 8' by the time you reach the top floor with view, and the windows on that floor were centered in the wall space - when standing you had to bend over to see out of the windows. Still, we loved the building and tried hard to find a redevelopment plan we could get financing for. We couldn't. The building was poorly built, rebar supporting the floors was within 1" of the bottom of the concrete floors, and instead of adding support to the concrete they were ating as a basket trying to hold the weight of the concrete. The roof and floors were sagging in excess of 6" between 13' column centers. The cost to fix the structural issues of the building far exceeded the potential marketability of s small building with low ceilings. Once our engineers declared the building a danger, we felt it needed to come down. After the fact, I think our engineers where wrong - it took forever to take the building down, it didn't give up easily. We're disappointed too, to lose the building, but it was a hard decision to make. We're trying to make the construction in the block interesting and something worthy of area. We hope you will visit Sterrett Street - as of 8/15/05 1209 Sterrett is open Sat/Sun 1-5pm.

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The lower rendering is The Richey Street Brownstones at Sterrett Street.  You can see floor plans at www.sterrettstreet.com.  These will be built in late 2006 pending pre-sales of 3 of 7 units.  Price per SF will be around $165.  This isn't downtown, and it isn't priced like downtown either.  Did we do okay with the design?

The designs are great for the Sterrett Street project but I guess we will have to see how similar the brownstones look to the renderings. I have respect for your company though when looking at some of the suburban styled projects happening around town by other developers.

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Did we do okay with the design?

They aren't bad. I love the traditional brownstone look and I think a lot of "traditional" people in Houston will like them too. The contemporary ones really aren't my speed, so I'll just leave it at that.

I do have to ask.. This just kills me. Why do designers feel the need to have the kitchen and living space on the second floor? I understand if you want to break it up a bit with some plans having the kitchen/living on the first and others on the second. Overall, most patio and town-homes only have it on the second floor. Why is this? :huh:

I, for one, hate to park in my garage and lug 20-some bags of groceries upstairs to my kitchen. I've only found three builders who have plans with the kitchen on the first floor: Juliett, Perry, and InTown. (Yeah, guess who I'm going with.)

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^^

because of space. Most patio home don't have room on the first floor for a kitchen and livingroom. So they put a bedroom, office, or a media room down there. The second floor allow for a large living space.

I like the concept. It's not much different than a lot of the old victorian homes in San Fransisco. Also, many brownstones in New York have a floor below the living area. It isn't alway a basement either.

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because of space.  Most patio home don't have room on the first floor for a kitchen and livingroom.  So they put a bedroom, office, or a media room down there.  The second floor allow for a large living space. 

I've seen ones where, yes, there wouldn't be enough space for it. HHN and Lovett are exceptions? I've seen. They have plenty of room on the first floor, but instead they make game rooms or "flex space" with a full bath (and I mean full). With all of that room, they still put the kitchen on the second floor. In that case, it seems more like it was someone's preference and not about the space.

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Could be. The patio home next to me has there kitchen and living on first floor. My only complaint is that there is a lack of light coming into those rooms on the first floor.

Most patio homes don't have back yards to really pull in a lot of light and there is usually an 8 or 10ft fence back there.

My living an kitchen being on the second floor lets lots of light in. I have two small bedrooms on the first floor with a full back. These bedrooms are more condusive to the darker environment. Just my preference.

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  • 5 months later...

Its pretty hard to get kitchen on first floor, economics play a huge role. I do have 5 townhomes planned at st charles and rusk that will have first floor kitchen/living. True they only have a small amount of natural light but on the flip side it really helps on cooling the place. The other project I did at Dowling and Bell where the kitchen/liv are on first floor has very low cooling costs compared to 3 story/second floor kit/liv counterparts. A year ago summer bills were around $80 a month in summer, those have gone up to $120 or so in the summer now.

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I guess I am a "traditional" Houstonian, cause I love the brownstones. I could even stand a block or two of these in the Heights (I know, it's treasonous, but, I like them).

The others aren't bad either. Upstairs patio view should be nice.

I'd love to see some brownstones in the Heights. A row of them on Yale would be great.

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Real Brownstones would be nice. By real, I mean with REAL stone not that fake styrofoam/stucco crap that is usually used in Houston.

Isn't that stone hard to come by though? But I wish we could have the real ones as well.

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  • 2 months later...

Are the Richey Street rowhomes in the warehouse district sold out? I checked HAR but there are none listed. Just one more Sterrett Street condo left. I checked the Sterrett Street project website and it says the Richey Street elevation starts construction January 2006. Anyone been there since then to see if construction has started?

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