It seems kind of bold to pursue the development of a hotel during a pandemic of unspecified length and impact, but as we've seen in recent weeks, plenty of projects in Austin are still chugging along. Not least of these is the oddball 159-room hotel plan by Trend Hospitality LP and developer William Franks for 1415 Lavaca Street, which would raise a 12-story structure above the ...
historic preservation
The Seaholm Waterfront’s First Phase Is Ready to Roll on Lady Bird Lake
It's not like we haven't had plenty of other important things to think about lately, but over the last few months our minds have wandered once again to the status of the Seaholm Waterfront, the long-awaited adaptive reuse project by the Austin Parks and Recreation Department, the Trail Foundation, the Austin Parks Foundation, and local architecture firm Cotera + Reed to ...
Govalle’s Art Deco Wastewater Plant is an East Side Architectural Gem
The federal agencies of the New Deal brought some classic examples of Depression-era public works architecture to Austin in the 1930s, much of which embodies the forever-popular Art Deco styles known as Streamline Moderne and PWA Moderne. Though most of these buildings still stand in the city today, one shining local example remains decidedly under the radar, likely due to its ...
Here’s Hanover Brazos Street, Ready for Its Close-Up in Downtown Austin
You'll notice in our prior coverage of Hanover Brazos Street, the 45-floor, 308-unit apartment tower planned by Houston developers the Hanover Company for the southeast corner of East Third and Brazos Streets, there are almost no images including the top of the building. That's because its architects at Chicago firm SCB were being pretty coy about releasing full views -- ...
A Field Guide to Austin’s New Deal-Era Public Works Architecture
Perhaps the most lasting impact of the New Deal programs enacted during the 1930s by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in response to the economic woes of the Great Depression is found in its public works projects, built or funded by an alphabet soup of federal agencies including the Public Works Administration (PWA), the Works Progress Administration (WPA), the Civilian ...
