Luminare

...yeah because they are just bulldozing everything just for the fun of it, right?

I'll post something either tomorrow or later this afternoon.

Agreed. They certainly pulled all the stops, but luckily their hasty decision didn't put them in a precarious position. Some might say this design choice tittered on the edge a little and just fell flat, but I would have to disagree with such a jump to conclusions. Certainly the designers would not exhibit such a gaping pit in their logic from which a person could toss a vehicle full of malice.

I wonder if they could move the house to another lot? They also need to do some serious road infrastructure if they are going to drop more multi-family/mixed-use.

I'm surprised with the lack of a single unifying clarity, in terms of style, over the last decade that we haven't seen a sort of return to the Battle of the Styles of which consumed the architectural discourse before the rise of Modernism (which I really hope doesn't happen as that was complete chaos!). I can slightly see where you pick up an "Egyptian feel" I think it has to do with the vertical nature of the building and the brick patterns, but it looks more like a splice between Neo Deco, and early Modern.

Building needs a hell lot of TLC, but you are right. In the right hands it could really pop. I like how the large Mid Main development is preserving the smaller stores that are next to it on Alabama & Main and Winbern & Main. Probably the only area of Midtown that has some character.

Drove by this morning and demolition has begun! The first to go was the old funeral home (the white building with the faux classical columns).

Do we have a master plan for the surrounding area?

I know right? It's when you really know that post-modernism has gotten a little out of hand...

I agree. It totally clashed with the rest of the architecture...

Almost all major newspapers will have a kind of dumby site in lieu to the real thing which you will need to pay for. When you do pay for it, from what I hear, the content is quite good and fleshed out. Lets also remember that the Chronicle was one of the first to move from Newspapers to mostly Online. While not every article like in every newspaper or opinion column in paper or tv, it does do a decent job of covering Houston and other areas of town. It also does just good enough for articles to be picked up nationally and I do see chron articles mentioned in reddit feeds frequently. The biggest problem is that they have succumbed to the same problems most other journalist have, and that is the quickened pace of putting out articles just so they can be "first" rather than verifying sources, or correcting grammar, or what's worse is when you are trying to type articles up so quickly you own biases and inclinations will start to seep through instead of a more neutral informative article some major articles feel as if they have an agenda. The biggest improvements they can make is by disabling comments on general news topics and restricting it to only opinion pieces. CNN has done this on their website. At one point you could comment on almost every article, but then it just turns into a cesspool of racism, trolling, and downright despicable opinions. Of course CNN has also done the most terrible thing ever which is literally becoming the reporters of "Twitter News" *facepalm* When you put it up against other papers it's about the norm with current journalistic trends and attitudes. The great paradigm shift will be when cable/satellite tv takes inevitable plunge which will then kill the 24 news cycle as we know it and then you get news which has to survive purely for it's journalist merits rather than just.....omg we have like 8hrs of programming we have fill.....quick make up something! Of course it could create a feeding frenzy where news becomes so bit sized to get out stories quickly that it becomes insignificant.....but I'll take the former than the latter. Again I think the death of TV will be the big change when it comes to problems stated above.

Alright I don't really want to divert this to another topic, but the only way to bring the train below grade is to reroute the entire drainage creek that runs along side it from Buffalo Bayou to Brays Bayou. It can be done, and should be done, but man that would be expensive. It's an option that should always be on the table. The biggest problem is also Afton Oaks. They are the biggest stalwarts to real progressive redevelopment in that whole area. Which funny because it's not like they are trying to stop general construction, just construction that they feel goes against their suburban attitudes. Now when I said before that this area is pretty upscale and so non-diversity is ok here because it will make the area rather distinct, I think that whatever happens to that Target or other bigbox stores in the area should be turned into market centers of mixed-use more inclined to those with modest to slightly affluent income so it balances the area out.

Thats a pretty impressive lineup... Lots of diversity in those stores and restaurants and the movie theater will be huge for that area in terms of foot traffic for all those other stores. While I was going to knock it for less diversity in terms of income variety in retail.....lets not kid ourselves here. This is meant to be a draw for upscale living and intends to draw a particular clientele. It knows what it is and is really trying to hit it hard.

Why the hell are we talking about oil, possible recessions, and OPEC nations, in a thread about an East End Midrise? (not just here by the way, but it's happening everywhere!) Just because oil prices drop below $70 doesn't mean this has to be discussed in EVERY thread ad nauseam! Especially those of you doom and gloom guys who at every chance a potential shortfall/crisis happens you see it as a pass to spell doom for a project and it's disgusting. Get over yourselves already.....Leave the over-analysis and sensationalism to the much maligned 24hr News Cycle.

There was lots of activity on the site this morning! Looked like a lot of electricians and civil workers getting everything ready for demolition.

Isn't this near the neo-deco strip center on Washington?

Isn't this near the neo-deco strip center on Washington?

....how dare you take Robert Downy Jr. from me D:

They would do better to just divide this building up in pieces and rebuild the entire thing in phases or maybe getting different architects to design each subsequent section. That could be interesting. The biggest change that needs to happen is to make the area more pedestrian friendly.

yeah you got me

I'm going to jump right in and say that this is normal for rebar to do that before they put the form work in place to create the column. Another is just the image. It looks like the image is compressed so it's exaggerating that.

And who said they are getting rid of the other house? Or is that your claim? I didn't hear anything in regard to 'we are going to destroy this other house we aren't using.' Quite possible they will just relocate the house somewhere else. Make it a monument and call it a day.

If there was ever a hit that needed to be placed on an architect....its for that building >.>

Yeah thats on the field. Thats just shitty. The brick on the exterior is great, but yeah lets not place either building on a pedistal i think is what should be taken away from this.

Ok I don't understand this! Sure I wanted something more contemporary (I'm sure others did too), and sure it would have been nice if it wasn't "prefabricated panels", but what they came up with is pretty ingenious actually. Not to mention if this wasn't prefabricated then this project would have taken another year to complete with a possible whole year of football removed from the stadium. I also don't understand this notion that "pre-fab" equals laziness or cheap. If done incorrectly it can be so, but almost every project today is done with some prefab. I mean all of what is on your construction site today is going to be "pre-fab". It's like peoples argument about "processed food" and "organic food". It's a bit silly. Also another myth about the seams that you see. You would see the same seams on any type of masonry project. They are called control joints and they are essential in this type of wall construction. You see them on any brick wall! It's more noticable due to the scale a shear vertical nature of the towers. where most of the brick used in Baylors stadium is keep relatively lower to the ground. Furthermore lets not have a circlejerk about Baylors stadium (a stadium I really like btw...no seriously its very attractive), but lets not apply that situation to here. They are completely different buildings both built in entirely different circumstances. One is a renovation and the other is a completely new building. With a completely new building you can do different things than with a renovation. Renovation also implies that you are "redoing" parts or the whole of a building while keeping it's central integrity which is what they did. Baylor, yes, does have brick in it's stadium but it's not used in a monumental facade type way as it is being used at Kyle Field. I mean Kyle Field is almost all Brick from top to bottom while Baylor it's not. It only goes up to about halfway and then transitions into other materials. It's also not the main feature of the building while the brick facade is for Kyle Field and that's because it's suppose to feel more traditional while Baylor is more contemporary. Sorry for the rant, but I couldn't let this get any further from the truth than where it was going. If you don't like it aesthetically then that's perfectly ok! I would rather have something different, but when you build a stadium for $450 million dollars....they aren't building it on the cheap -.- They are building it for the speed of construction and that means that certain ways of doing things aren't going to be optimal. One last thing....it's the same kind of brick. I bet my salary that both projects are using King Brick or some sort of Modular Brick, but it's all the same.