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Drewery Place: Multifamily High-Rise At 2850 Fannin St.


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2 hours ago, HOU_huckster said:

 

This isn't true, though. Look for D&Q (Houston's best beer shop), Ono Poke (Houston's best poke), Foelber Pottery (a goddamn institution), Chapultepec, BCN, etc. Appearances are deceiving. This is the Houston I love quite frankly. The Houston that's a little less obvious (and, sure, slightly unkempt) but rewarding. 

Agree! I lived on Jack and walked to all these places. It's actually a very cool neighborhood. Much better when Brooklyn was still open. Used to walk across the street for UH games. 

Edited by j_cuevas713
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13 hours ago, HOU_huckster said:

 

This isn't true, though. Look for D&Q (Houston's best beer shop), Ono Poke (Houston's best poke), Foelber Pottery (a goddamn institution), Chapultepec, BCN, etc. Appearances are deceiving. This is the Houston I love quite frankly. The Houston that's a little less obvious (and, sure, slightly unkempt) but rewarding. 

True. I feel like there’s so much more potential there though.

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5 hours ago, TheSirDingle said:

I've seen some over reactions to design changes, but this takes the cake 🤣🤣

 

Putting that aside, and just real talk about design, looking at Preston's portfolio, is this really a shocker? Even with the current climate. I can buy the argument that the economy chopped the building by about 10 stories, but design wise that's all on the architect. I constantly have problems with architects who are like this. If you can not achieve it then don't sell it. It would have been better if they had undersold and then delivered the version they currently have. Nothing in Preston's portfolio tells me they excel with anything curvilinear. I see a few buildings with some stock "Oh lets place a gentle bezier curve here," but that's it. What this should tell people, at the end of the day, is that sure there was some obvious value engineering, but overall design wise this firm oversold and under delivered, and that is on them. Not the value engineering. Look at what Michael Hsu does, or Munoz Albin, etc... Those are just examples of firms that make sure what they sell is actually what gets built keeping in mind that at some point the budget in every project gets trimmed. Let's not let the architects potentially get away from this penalty free with an excuse of...it was the economy, and so we had to value engineer. No this is a pattern. They can not do curvilinear work. Just a bad choice in architect, and I hope Caydon learns from this.

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1 hour ago, Luminare said:

 

Putting that aside, and just real talk about design, looking at Preston's portfolio, is this really a shocker? Even with the current climate. I can buy the argument that the economy chopped the building by about 10 stories, but design wise that's all on the architect. I constantly have problems with architects who are like this. If you can not achieve it then don't sell it. It would have been better if they had undersold and then delivered the version they currently have. Nothing in Preston's portfolio tells me they excel with anything curvilinear. I see a few buildings with some stock "Oh lets place a gentle bezier curve here," but that's it. What this should tell people, at the end of the day, is that sure there was some obvious value engineering, but overall design wise this firm oversold and under delivered, and that is on them. Not the value engineering. Look at what Michael Hsu does, or Munoz Albin, etc... Those are just examples of firms that make sure what they sell is actually what gets built keeping in mind that at some point the budget in every project gets trimmed. Let's not let the architects potentially get away from this penalty free with an excuse of...it was the economy, and so we had to value engineer. No this is a pattern. They can not do curvilinear work. Just a bad choice in architect, and I hope Caydon learns from this.

Agreed, Preston never delivers on their promises. I mean it's not a bad design, hell it's actually pretty above average compared to most. Its just why didn't they just shrink down the other design, it still would of looked great with a few floors cut off. Come on Preston do better, hope Caydon doesn't choose them again. 

I have a feeling a large part of the scale back was part of the deep dive the hotel market did, while Kimpton is a high tier brand even they can't avoid this massive of a melt down. They might of had a pretty large say in this design change, considering the circumstances. 

 

I'm sure this isn't go to negatively affect the rest of the development, since this is honestly the best time to build condos/residential (I think I spotted some permits for the other parts). Although while it's scaled down considerably, it's still a great addition to the overall development and a once dead area of Houston. I'm hopping the laneways concept takeoffs in Houston, just love the idea of large pedestrian oriented, vehicle free canyons. While I wish they would of kept the original design, this will still be a massive plus to the skyline and pedestrian environment of Houston/midtown. 

Edited by TheSirDingle
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18 hours ago, wxman said:

The quintessential Houston treatment. Ghetto.

 

That is a 1983 office building, straight up. Next

 

You either need to learn the meaning of quintessential, or pay some attention to development in other cities.  There is nothing quintessentially Houston about this.  Design changes and value engineering happen EVERYWHERE.

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13 hours ago, Luminare said:

 

Putting that aside, and just real talk about design, looking at Preston's portfolio, is this really a shocker? Even with the current climate. I can buy the argument that the economy chopped the building by about 10 stories, but design wise that's all on the architect. I constantly have problems with architects who are like this. If you can not achieve it then don't sell it. It would have been better if they had undersold and then delivered the version they currently have. Nothing in Preston's portfolio tells me they excel with anything curvilinear. I see a few buildings with some stock "Oh lets place a gentle bezier curve here," but that's it. What this should tell people, at the end of the day, is that sure there was some obvious value engineering, but overall design wise this firm oversold and under delivered, and that is on them. Not the value engineering. Look at what Michael Hsu does, or Munoz Albin, etc... Those are just examples of firms that make sure what they sell is actually what gets built keeping in mind that at some point the budget in every project gets trimmed. Let's not let the architects potentially get away from this penalty free with an excuse of...it was the economy, and so we had to value engineer. No this is a pattern. They can not do curvilinear work. Just a bad choice in architect, and I hope Caydon learns from this.

 

Are you saying they sold a design that could not be built at stated cost and so had to change the design, or are you saying that they sold a design that could have been built at the original cost, but when the cost was cut, they didn't have a good Plan B? I'm guessing the former.

 

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26 minutes ago, West Timer said:

Whatever. This will be the best looking and tallest tower ever built. (...in Midtown) (...so far). Curves aren't everything. It still looks pretty classy to me.

Midtown still has sooooo much empty.

This is soooooo much better than the waste of space across the street.

Signature towers will come one the area improves.

 

The original would have been nice but even the new design is still a plus going off of how empty and crappy the area is.

 

The homeless engage in Drugs and Prostitution a block in every direction from this development so still getting a neat tower in a not so neat area that may cause the area to improve is still a win for me

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2 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

Are you saying they sold a design that could not be built at stated cost and so had to change the design, or are you saying that they sold a design that could have been built at the original cost, but when the cost was cut, they didn't have a good Plan B? I'm guessing the former.

 

Two things can be true at the same time. In this case I would say both are a possibility. This is objectively the case. Again look at their portfolio of work. One notices a pattern of nearly zero curvilinear buildings. So the former is true, which is this was a bad architect choice. Then you compound that with the economy on top of the bad architect choice, and therefore you get the resulting design we see now. I know this from professional experience. I've seen project architects cave to financial pressures and fail to keep the "promises" they made because they don't know how to work within the constraints, and so say to hell with it, just cut everything and box it up. I've seen others in that same situation say, well maybe we can't do it this exact way, but maybe we can make it work another way. Ok cut here, thats fine, but here this is where we make a stand and figure out with our means how we can get this done. These situations really highlight who are actually good architects who are creative and are able to pivot out of a bad situation, and who are just posers.

 

There is a legitimate argument to be made that during really good economic climates, more middle of the road, or mediocre outfits will start to extend themselves and try new things to get ahead and change. Maybe Preston was on the heels of trying new types of design that they aren't experienced at. I've seen this as the case as well. It's a challenging process to break a pre-established mold and do something different. I have a lot of experience in this. They maybe thought they could pull off the original, and then the economic sunk, and that made them revert to previous habits. That happens too.

 

Great questions though.

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On 7/19/2020 at 3:19 PM, wxman said:

The quintessential Houston treatment. Ghetto.

 

That is a 1983 office building, straight up. Next

It's awful, for sure, but will shine like the Williams Tower Beacon against the Mercer (3300 Main/The Travis).

 

Hoping to see more street level renderings.

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It's not that bad of a value engineer on this one. The original spirit of the first render is still there, it just doesn't have the curved inward walls whose molds are cost prohibitive. 
The COULD have pulled an Allesandra here, they didn't.

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7 hours ago, CREguy13 said:

I'm fine with a nice coffee shop, considering  the next phase will likely have much more retail and this only occupies a portion of the block.

 

I'm also betting on Kimpton having a pretty sweet hotel bar which should be a solid landing spot in the area.  This should add to the ground floor activity and will most certainly have a nice patio designed to engage the adjacent laneways buildings.

 

If it's like their other hotels I'm sure the bar and attached restaurant will be a draw for local residents.  Kimpton has expanded rapidly since being acquired by IHG hopefully the level of service and details don't diminish.  

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On 7/28/2020 at 7:10 AM, aachor said:

33 stories. 
Start date, 10/1/2020
Completion date, 9/30/2023

I'm a bit disappointed that it's going to take three years. The existing building broke ground in November of 2017 and was pretty much completed two years later. 

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