When a fire destroyed Rio Grande Street bakery and restaurant Texas French Bread back in January, the future of this longtime local business didn’t seem particularly sunny . Owner Murph Willcott and his wife Carissa Ries, devastated at the loss of the nearly century-old building at this site occupied by their business since 1986, weren’t sure what a path forward for their…
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This Downtown Demolition Application Could Tell a Tower-Shaped Story
A demolition application scheduled to appear at the October 5 meeting of the city’s Historic Landmark Commission could point to a new tower development on the northwestern edge of downtown Austin. The permit, listed for consideration on the upcoming meeting’s agenda, indicates an applicant is seeking to demolish the building at 1800 Guadalupe Street, a former apartment building dating…
Here’s the Latest Look for Downtown Austin’s HealthSouth Redevelopment
The 1.73-acre city-owned downtown property at 1215 Red River Street, formerly home to the HealthSouth Rehabilitation Hospital, is the lesser-known cousin of the significantly larger Central Health redevelopment next door — the latter project’s bringing a roughly 14-acre planned unit development with commercial and residential uses under the auspices of the University of Texas and Dell Medical School’s “Innovation District” branding…
A Defunct Post Office Ponders Its Future Under Hyde Park’s All-Seeing Eye
The closing of the Hyde Park neighborhood’s “beloved” post office at 4300 Speedway sent shockwaves through one of Austin’s most charming and change-averse districts last year, with the possibility of the 1967 building’s demolition and replacement by something a few floors taller sparking a public discourse over whether the property’s owner and potential developer Blake Thompson of local firm State Street…
East Austin’s Latest Mixed-Use Project Pioneers Affordable Commercial Space
A large mixed-use development set to transform a vacant 15-acre tract currently zoned mostly for industrial use in far East Austin hopes to introduce a new community benefit that could serve as a model for future projects — 10,000 square feet of affordable commercial space, offered at 60 percent of market rent to small arts-focused local businesses…
On Downtown Austin’s West End, a Historic Building Stands in Its Own Way
The potential redevelopment of the Delta Kappa Gamma Society International Headquarters Building on the west end of downtown Austin into a residential tower by developers Stratus Properties and Chicago architects SCB presents an interesting situation to the City of Austin’s Historic Landmark Commission: what happens when the organization that originally built a historic building — and actually…