Dallas-based Crow Holdings Industrial announced last week that it broke ground on Victory Commerce Center, a spec industrial project in the southeast Houston area.

A Courtyard by Marriott hotel broke ground last week in Generation Park, Houston-based McCord Development Inc.’s 4,000-acre master-planned commercial park at the northeast corner of Beltway 8.

Oxford, Ohio-based Hotel Development Services is developing the hotel — the company’s first in Texas — on a 1-acre site, according to a press release. Expo Construction Group is the general contractor, and Mark Carlsen Design and Powers Brown Architecture worked on the project’s design and architecture. HDS will partner with American Hospitality Management to oversee the hotel’s day-to-day construction and management.

The five-story, 144-room hotel will include more than 2,000 square feet of meeting space, a business center, 24-hour market, large fitness center, outdoor pool, casual workspaces and a bistro offering grab-and-go food options and Starbucks Coffee, per the release. Twenty-four of the rooms will have balconies overlooking a plaza, and the hotel’s design will be integrated into the pedestrian promenade of Redemption Square, a 52-acre mixed-use district within Generation Park. (more…)

Foster Ridge Distribution Center, a 327,000-square-foot industrial facility in northeast San Antonio, is slated for a first-quarter 2019 completion.

Firm Opens Canada Headquarters in Toronto

Units under 500 square feet started around $150,000, but prices went up

Powers Brown Architecture was ranked in Architectural Record Top 300 U.S. Architecture Firms.

The U.S. branch of Tokyo-based chemical company Kuraray Co. Ltd. signed a huge lease at a brand-new industrial park in Houston, while a local ready-to-assemble furniture company inked a warehouse lease to expand its distribution operations.

Both leases were announced June 6.

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Houston-based Kuraray America Inc. signed a long-term lease for 465,851 square feet in… more

COURTESY AVERA COS.

Houston-based Kuraray America Inc. signed a long-term lease for 465,851 square feet in Avera Cos.’ new Bayport Logistics Park. Houston-based Avera announced last month it would develop the industrial complex in Pasadena, and Kuraray is the first tenant.

John Littman of Cushman & Wakefield represented Kuraray, and Jason Dillee of Cushman & Wakefield represented the landlord.

Kuraray will occupy two build-to-suit facilities — called buildings 2 and 3 — on 30.5 acres. Building 2 is rail-served and will have a 36-foot clear height, while Building 3 will have a 32-foot clear height.

When it was announced last month, Bayport Logistics Park was billed as a 143-acre industrial complex just south of Avera’s Bayport Industrial Park, a three-building, 738,610-square-foot project announced in June 2016. Now, Avera is referring to the combined 185 acres as Bayport Logistics Park. (more…)

Just under 40 miles away from Houston's core, an economic juggernaut is quietly settling into its multimillion-square-foot manufacturing hub.

Nearly 1,000 employees have moved into Daikin Industries Ltd.'s new industrial plant in Waller County. The Japanese air-conditioning giant's 4.1 million-square-foot manufacturing plant in Hockley, dubbed the Daikin Texas Technology Park, will eventually employ upward of 4,000 workers, a Daikin spokesperson said. Click through the slideshow for a look inside the facility.

VIEW SLIDESHOW 22 photos

Daikin Industries Ltd.'s new 4 million-square-foot facility in Waller County. Eventually,… more

The facility cost $417 million to develop. Overall, it's at roughly 25 percent operating capacity, the spokesperson said.

Around half of the plant is dedicated to manufacturing; the other half handles distribution. On the distribution side of the plant, thousands of boxes of Daikin equipment are nearly stacked wall-to-wall and inch toward the ceiling. Almost any Daikin or Goodman HVAC product – that is, mostly air-conditioning or heating units – shipped in the U.S. will pass through the new Waller County facility. (more…)

by Jeffrey Blaine Brown, FAIA

New industrial developments continue to rise around the Houston area, with two new projects announced so far this week.

One Houston-based developer has announced a new industrial park in southeast Houston, while another plans to build warehouses in southwest Houston. (more…)

Powers Brown Architecture Expands Interior Design Offering in Denver

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SCHERTZ, TEXAS — Conor Commercial Real Estate has delivered Doerr Lane Industrial Park, a speculative cross-dock industrial building in Schertz, a northeast suburb of San Antonio. Situated within Tri County Business Park, the 213,864-square-foot property features 32-foot clear heights, 54 dock-high loading doors, two truck courts and on-site parking for 250 vehicles and 31 trailers. The design team includes Cadence McShane Construction Co. and Powers Brown Architecture. The building is available for immediate occupancy. Terry Warth, Rob Burlingame and Joshua Aguilar of CBRE are marketing the property.

A colorful, spiral staircase, cement-inspired wall fixtures and a tech-inspired aesthetic set apart Cemex's new U.S. headquarters.

Mexico-based Cemex SAB de CV, a building materials provider, will relocate its U.S. headquarters to 80,000 square feet in 10100 Katy Freeway in west Houstonstarting Jan. 17. The MetroNational-developed building topped out in June and is 240,000 square feet. Click through the slideshow to tour Cemex's space.

VIEW SLIDESHOW 13 photos

Cresa principal Stephen Heal, Cemex's director of real estate Ed Prins and Cresa… more

Cemex will vacate 42,000 square feet at Memorial Hermann Tower at 929 Gessner Rd., Cresa's Sue Rogers said. Rogers, alongside Steven Heal, represented Cresa in its 10100 Katy Freeway lease. MetroNational represented itself.

Cemex's new U.S. headquarters will serve as a testament to the company's products – there are cement fixtures inset into the walls and portions of Cemex's furniture that is made from cement. The office's main stairwell, a colorful and winding bridge between the second and third floors, has handlebars made of one of Cemex's rebar products. Most of the office's flooring is smooth, exposed cement. (more…)

A new industrial park in Missouri City has landed its first tenant.

Tire Universe leased 42,430 square feet — including 1,400 square feet for office space — at Gateway Southwest Industrial Park. The tire distributor, which has three existing locations in northwest Houston, Dallas and California, will occupy about one-third of the park’s first building.

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Tire Universe leased 42,430 square feet in Building 1 at Gateway Southwest Industrial… more

MARK JOHNSON PHOTOGRAPHY INC./COURTESY THE MCSHANE COS.

Joint venture partners San Antonio-based USAA Real Estate Co. and Illinois-based Conor Commercial Real Estate, a member of The McShane Cos., announced plans in December 2014 to develop Gateway Southwest on 36 acres at the interchange of Beltway 8 and U.S. 90 Alternate. (more…)

The Work Lodge, a co-working space in Vintage Park well-known for its slide in the lobby, is opening a second location, this time in The Woodlands.

The new space will be called The Work Lodge at Havenwood and is expected to open in early 2017, said CEO and founder Mike Thakur. It will be located in the new Havenwood development from J. Beard Real Estate Co., which is wrapping up construction.

While there won't be any slide in this location, Thakur expects to still jazz it up.

"We're going to put in some fun stuff," Thakur told the HBJ. "I don't know if I'm ready to shout about it yet, but it will have that playful feel in the co-working space." (more…)

Excerpt from Architizer: Click here for full article.

by Maya Sorabjee

With the advent of modern architecture and its commitment to material and formal honesty came the prominence of the minimalist memorial — designs of commemoration that favored the absorbent meaning of abstract forms to the prescriptive qualities of literal sculptures. After Maya Lin sliced the ground on the National Mall to create the black granite wound of the Vietnam War Memorial, and Peter Eisenman raised disorienting stelae out of Berlin’s fraught urban space to form the Monument to the Murdered Jews of Europe, many recent memorial designs have taken similarly understated routes, suggesting in a combination of both allusive and unspecific forms the shapeshifting nature of collective memory. The memorials in this collection, apart from their shared tendency towards minimalism, are by no means equivalent. But whether it is trauma or reverence, individual tragedy or mass conflict, the impetus behind commemoration is often rooted in a desire to pinpoint the collective memory in a shared physical experience, a space of reflection designed to hold the heaviness of history. Sometimes memorials, like the histories they embody, are controversial in their messages, audience and design. But in these moments, public repositories tend to work best when rendered abstract, allowing flecks of individual remembrance to color in their volumetric outlines.

Dallas-based real estate investment group Copeland Commercial LLC has landed $43.5 million in funds — $33.5 million in acquisition and development financing and another $10 million in equity — to build a new large speculative logistics hub.

The 900,043-square-foot industrial facility, called I-20 Commerce Center, is expected to get underway at 3535 N. Houston School Road in Lancaster in the near future. The facility sits in close proximity to three major interstates, as well as the Union Pacific Intermodal terminal and the FedEx ground facilities.

The development is one of a number of speculative projects throughout North Texas, with capital still becoming available for such logistics hubs.

A JLL team secured the $33.5 million in acquisition and development financing from American National Insurance Co. and raised $10 million in equity from ANICO Eagle LLC, who will be the joint venture partner in the spec project.

JLL's Kurt Griffin and Nathan Orbin led the team on the acquisition of the land and are overseeing leasing of the project. Adam Mengacci of JLL led the team's financing efforts.

Powers Brown Architecture is the project architect for I-20 Commerce Center. (more…)

A rendering of the upcoming offices at 4624 N. Central Park Blvd.

Bursting out of an office that is now in the wrecking ball’s path, a concessionaire company is building itself a new headquarters.

Service Systems Associates Inc. is planning a new 45,000-square-foot office building in Northfield.

Building co-developer John Comunale said SSA grew out of its office at the National Western Complex, a space it will need to vacant anyway to make way for the planned stock show redevelopment.

“Their current space is about 11,000 square feet, and they’re on top of each other,” Comunale said. “They’re sharing offices; they’re sharing cubicles.”

One Central Park, as the new building will be called, will take shape at 4624 N. Central Park Blvd., just north of the Drury Inn and Suites off of Interstate 70. Right now the city owns the real estate, but Comunale said they will buy the property in a deal closing next month. (more…)

A bundle of 10 speculative buildings spanning four suburban counties and totaling 650,000 square feet are now under construction by St. John Properties.

The projects will produce a total of 400,000 square feet of new Class A office in Anne Arundel, Howard, Carroll and Baltimore counties. In Anne Arundel, for example, four buildings comprised of more than 200,000 square feet are under development.

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A 100,000-square-foot office building is under construction at the Annapolis Junction… more

ST. JOHN PROPERTIES

The Anne Arundel projects include a 126,500-square-foot building at I-97 Business Park.

The new construction "is spurred by our continued confidence in the Maryland economy," Rick Williamson, St. John's senior vice president of leasing, said in a statement.

Williamson said the company's leasing activity this year is showing strength in health care and technology. (more…)

When Novel Creative Development LLC announced plans for Houston’s first major micro-unit condominium in fall 2015, the new developer expected to sell all 550 units before breaking ground in June 2016.

Novel Creative Development was confident it would find a market among young, single working professionals interested in buying affordable homes that are less than 500 square feet. The Houston developer, founded by a group of doctors and real estate investors in New York, unveiled plans to build Ivy Lofts, a 24-story, 550-unit condo project at 2604 Leeland Avenue in East Downtown.

Ivy Lofts, designed by Houston-based Powers Brown Architecture, offered micro-unit condos ranging in size from 304 square feet to 1,001 square feet. Prices started from $119,000 for a 300-square-foot loft to $375,000 for condos 700-square-feet and larger. These units would feature space-saving amenities, such as transformable furniture like Murphy beds and a coffee table that turns into a desk.

However, four months after opening an on-site sales center, Ivy Lofts had secured contracts from only 68 prospective buyers, said Wen Pin Tsai, Novel Creative Development’s vice president of business development. (more…)

A Midtown building built in 1955 will be restored to have office, ground-floor retail, and rooftop event space right as the submarket is undergoing a rebirth of its own.

The Greensheet building at 2601 Main St. was sold to Houston's PLC Capital Corp. for an undisclosed price. PLC Capital plans to renovate the building's facade, entry lobby and common areas.

Renovations should kick off in mid-July and wrap up in September. The building has 10,000 square feet of ground-level retail space that Brent Friedman, president of PLC Capital, hopes to split between a restaurant user and another retail user. Greensheet Inc. occupies the second and third floors of the building, leaving the 12,000-square-foot fourth floor open for leasing. The building's fifth floor, a 2,000-square-foot air-conditioned penthouse space with rooftop access, could be used for an event-venue user. PLC Capital has already been approached by two event-venue users, Friedman said, even though he hasn't started marketing the building yet.

"We're working (with) mid-century modern architecture, so we'll embrace that," Friedman said of the building. "We want to replace existing entryway trim and glass with a cooler, period-specific entrance."

Friedman said he wasn't immediately wooed by Midtown as an office market, but was struck by its ability to attract and retain Millennials. Among other things, he said a recent visit to Tampa's Hyde Park Village, a revitalized historic neighborhood that's attracted both Millennials and office users, made him realize that Houston is lacking in that area. (more…)

Houston-based MetroNational's first office building north of Interstate 10 is moving toward completion.

The building at 10100 Katy Freeway topped out on June 14, a MetroNational representative said. The 240,000-square-foot office building should deliver in early 2017, the spokesperson said. The core and shell will be complete in fall 2016. Houston-based Anslow Bryant Construction is building the core and shell.

The six-story building is on an 18-acre tract at the northwest corner of Gessner Road and Interstate 10 and is pre-certified as LEED Silver.

The building's sole tenant, Cemex (NYSE: CX), a Mexico-based building materials company, will occupy 80,000 square feet on the second and third floors. Cemex has had an office in Memorial City since 2005. Its current U.S. headquarters are at 929 Gessner Road, suite 1900. Sue Rogers and Steven Heal of Cresa represented Cemex in its lease, and MetroNational represented itself in the deal.

Houston-based Powers Brown Architecture designed the building.

Cara Smith Reporter Houston Business Journal

Click here for full article.

Exec: This submarket gives my Millennial workers everything they need

Houston-based Powers Brown Architecture LLC may be the sole tenant inside Midtown's Central Square office development, but being the first one in an office building is a familiar feeling for Jeffrey Brown, founding partner and design principal at the firm.

Powers Brown, which reported $18.61 million in 2015 billings, spent the last 17 years at 1314 Texas Avenue in the Central Business District. Powers Brown was one of the building's first tenants, and Brown said the area's amenities were bleak at best.

"It was a food desert," Brown said. "When we first moved down there in 1999, it was nothing – no clubs, no bars, certainly nothing within walking distance."

Houston's downtown core is now bustling today. The 1314 Texas Avenue building is home to Irma's Southwest Grill, a household name among Houston foodies and a tenant that Brown remembers as a newcomer. A number of now-esteemed downtown restaurants are scattered around 1314 Texas Avenue, including Treebeards, Vic & Anthony's Steakhouse and more. Powers Brown didn't want to move out of the building, Brown said, but the building was sold and pegged to become a residential tower. He wanted to keep his company in an urban environment, too – but finding a building downtown that would take a smaller lease in 2016 was a tall order.

"We’re only a 12,000- or 15,000-square-foot lease space," Brown said. "Nobody downtown wants that." (more…)

Houston-based Powers Brown Architecture LLC is the first office tenant in a 280,000-square-foot building undergoing a massive renovation at 2100 Travis St. in Midtown.

Powers Brown signed an 11,637-square-foot lease at Central Square, which occupies the entire city block bordered by Travis, Milam, Gray and Webster streets.

David Baker and Evelyn Ward with Transwestern represented the landlord, Claremont Properties. Drew Lewis and Robert LaCoure with Lee & Associates represented the tenant.

Powers Brown, the 10th-largest architectural firm in Houston, relocated from 1314 Texas Ave. Powers Brown said in a statement it will pursue a wellness certification and LEED certification, which will be made possible by extremely competitive rent rates. (more…)

Demand for office space in suburban Maryland and Northern Virginia is still struggling to rebound to pre-recession levels, but at least one D.C.-area developer is rolling the dice that the tenants will come if you build it first.

Columbia-based Corporate Office Properties Trust (NYSE: OFC) plans to break ground speculatively on a 75,000-square-foot office building at the University of Maryland's 126-acre research park. The park, called M Square, is already home the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, and Raytheon.

The planned three-story building at 5801 Research Park Drive was designed by Powers Brown Architecture and is slated to include 25,000-square-foot floorplates and an outdoor plaza.

The vacancy rate in suburban Maryland now hovers at about 20 percent, according first-quarter stats from JLL, with Prince George's County coming in higher at about 29 percent. At the same time, the university's presence has been a positive influence on the office market, generating demand from university spinoffs like FlexEl LLC, which committed earlier this year to leasing 10,000 square feet in College Park for a new research, development and manufacturing facility. (more…)

Ivy Lofts to feature small living spaces, customizable amenities in downtown

By Allen Jones

Office amenity space in Lake Jackson just got a lot swankier.

That's where Michigan-based The Dow Chemical Co.(NYSE: DOW) has a five-building research and development complex, dubbed the Texas Innovation Center, underway. One of the buildings called the Diamond Center wrapped up a few weeks ago, said Mike Wyatt of Core Real Estate LLC, the developer of the project. Click through the slideshow to take a tour of the Diamond Center.

The Greater Houston Partnership received Business Facilities' gold award in its 2015 Economic Development Deal of the Year competition for a major campus under construction.

Japan-based Daikin Industries Ltd.' s new $417 million campus in northwest Houston, dubbed the the Daikin-Goodman Comfortplex Campus, claimed the highest-ranking award in the competition. Business Facilities estimates that the new campus will generate $3.9 billion in annual economic impact for the Houston region, creating 4,600 direct jobs and more than 11,000 indirect or induced jobs.

The multistate site selection began in 2013, and Houston was chosen because of Daikin’s $3.7 billion acquisition of Houston’s Goodman Global. The northwest Houston site was chosen for its visibility and the accessible outbound distribution of products made at the plant. (more…)

Novel Creative Development LLC has revealed new details for Ivy Lofts, the first “micro-unit” condominium project in Houston. The Houston developer plans to build the 24-story, 550-unit project on a 1.4-acre city block, bounded by Leeland Avenue, Nagle Street, Pease Avenue and Live Oak Street in East Downtown. The land, which formerly housed a Vietnamese grocery store, was purchased in November 2014 for a little less than $3 million.

Novel Creative Development — founded by a group of doctors, real estate investors and midrise condo developers in New York — was inspired by My Micro NY, the first affordable micro-unit apartment building developed by Michael Bloomberg in Manhattan. They hope to bring the micro-unit concept — units that are less than 500 square feet and geared toward young, single working professionals— to Houston's up-and-coming EaDo neighborhood.

“It’s a new concept for Houston,” said Wen Pin Tsai, Novel Creative Development's vice president of business development. “We feel there’s potential for this in Houston.”

(more…)

By LAURA ELDER

Construction of a transit terminal that will add 159 parking spaces and fresh retail to the island’s downtown could be complete by mid-November, a year later than originally planned, port officials said. Next month, Port Director Michael Mierzwa is expected to present several leases to the port’s governing board that would allow a restaurant, a specialty convenience store and possibly an art gallery to move into the bottom floor of what will be called the Galveston Transit Terminal underway on the northeast corner of The Strand and 25th Street. Mierzwa declined Monday to divulge the names of the restaurant and retail tenants, saying only that the convenience store would cater to passengers and crews of cruise ships, as well as downtown residents. The retail shops likely won’t be open until December. The $6.3 million transit terminal, financed largely with a Federal Transit Administration grant, takes up half a block in The Strand Historic District and also will include public restrooms and a city bus terminal. It will connect by ramp to Shearn Moody Plaza, 25th Street and Harborside Drive. New construction of such magnitude is rare downtown, particularly in The Strand Historic District, defined by its 19th-century feel and carefully restored buildings occupied by galleries, restaurants, lofts, professional offices and shops. The port hopes to eventually use the spaces at the new terminal for parking for cruise-ship passengers. But until then, the spaces will be available to the general public in a downtown that has a shortage of places to park.The port in November of 2011 agreed to partner with the city in building the transportation terminal after outbidding Mitchell Historic Properties for the neighboring Shearn Moody Garage, which the city owned. The port bid about $3 million for the parking garage where it had a long-term lease and charged downtown office workers and others to park. Port employees, other tenants atShearn Moody Plaza and the public all use the 330-space Shearn Moody garage. Mitchell Historic Properties bid $1.75 million. After losing the bid Mitchell Historic Properties withdrew as developer of the transportation terminal saying Shearn Moody Garage had been essential for its development. The port also agreed to bring the Shearn Moody Garage up to code at the cost of about $1 million. The city will lease the transportation center from the port for 40 years. (more…)

Stream Realty has broken ground on the second phase of Bay Area Business Park, bringing more spec industrial space to what's become a very tight submarket.

The first phase of Bay Area Business Park includes three buildings, delivered in 2009, that total 1.2 million square feet. That phase is 100 percent leased to tenants including Honeywell International (NYSE: HON) and Calpine Corp. (NYSE: CPN)

(more…)

POWERS BROWN ARCHITECTURE | St. John Properties is developing a 100,000-square-foot office building in Howard County… more

St. John Properties Inc. is taking over a 100,000-square-foot office project in Howard County that will be a central component of the Annapolis Junction Town Center development.

Columbia-based Corporate Office Properties Trust originally planned to develop the office portion of the $180 million, mixed-use Annapolis Junction development, led by master developer Somerset Construction Co. But when COPT signed on, Somerset hadn't determined whether the office project would be built on a speculative basis, said Neil Greenberg, chief operating officer of Somerset. (more…)

COURTESY | UNITED PROPERTIES United Properties is planning 850,000 square feet of new industrial development at Enterprise Business Center.

COURTESY | NEWMARK GRUBB KNIGHT FRANK The first new phase of Inova Dry Creek will break ground in September.

Work is set to begin Sept. 15 and take about six months to complete, according to a construction permit. The site has an appraised value of $5.3 million.

Click here for full article

Paul TakahashiReporter-Houston Business Journal

Paul Takahashi Reporter-Houston Business Journal

By Katherine Feser

A new shopping center under construction in a hot Galleria location counts a big-box store as well as an extended-stay hotel among its tenants.

A site plan for the Shoppes at Uptown Crossing at the southeast corner of Westpark and South Rice Avenue includes a Wal-Mart Supercenter, a TownePlace Suites Hotel, El Pollo Loco, a Chick-Fil-A, a Jack in the Box, aMattress Firm, dentist's offices, an AT&T store and a Starbucks. The size of the Wal-Mart was not immediately available.

There is one 4,500-square-foot site left for lease, according to a brochure from Capital Retail Properties. (more…)

SIERRA PINES II, A SIX-STORY CLASS A TILT-UP OFFICE BUILDING IS THE FIRST OF ITS KIND IN TEXAS. THE PROJECT IS SITUATED ON A SNUG 4-ACRE SITE LOCATED IN THE WOODLANDS, A 28,000-ACRE COMMUNITY IN SUBURBAN HOUSTON, TEXAS.

CLASS A TILT?

Houston-based Freeway Properties has broken ground on the first mid-rise office building to be built west of the Grand Parkway in Katy.

The six-story, 151,000-square-foot building, dubbed Katy Ranch Offices Phase, will be located immediately off the eastbound exit ramp in the 130-acre mixed-use Katy Ranch Crossing complex, and is scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2015. The Class A-building will feature 24,800-square-foot floor plates with 45-foot bay depths for flexible space planning.

An Illinois-based manager and developer of industrial warehouse and distribution facilities has entered the Houston market with its first project.

International Airport Centers broke ground earlier this month on a 225,360-square-foot warehouse property located at 300 West Airtex Blvd. in North Houston near Interstate 45. It is scheduled for completion later this summer. Ed Frantz and Faron Wiley of CBRE’s Houston office have been hired to lease the project.

“Institutional capital has favored Houston due to the market’s sustained growth and excellent opportunities for business development,” Tom Lynch of CBRE said in a release. “This project is an indication of Houston’s continued demand for Class A warehouse and distribution facilities, particularly those with high clear heights.” (more…)

Transwestern said Thursday it will begin construction on a 660,000-square-foot Class A office project within the Energy Corridor.

The development, Westgate, sits on a 20.8-acre tract near Interstate 10 and Barker Cypress Road and will consist of three buildings that are 67 percent preleased. Transwestern did not disclose the tenants.

The Houston-based real estate company acquired the land for the development on Sept. 13 from Hearst Corp. for an undisclosed amount.

(more…)