Posts

Absence (and Renovation) Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

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The TxA office, shiny and new after months of renovation – photo by Alyssa Morris After several eager attempts, the TxA staff have finally begun to move upstairs into our freshly constructed office space. While the communications team will miss the water feature in our temporary basement office (a persistently leaky dishwasher that provided us with an endless stream of water and entertainment), the windows we have gained more than make up for it. Many thanks to Flynn Construction for being excellent partners in the process.  As with any renovation project, there have been growing pains as we learn to navigate our new…

Everything Old is New Again

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Construction progresses under the beamed ceiling at 500 Chicon – photo by Elizabeth Hackler 500 Chicon, with its exposed brick, soaring roof beams, and center atrium, is already beautiful. But the things that we love most about the building are also the things that cause challenges when attempting a renovation. In order to improve its functionality, changes to the HVAC system and acoustics needed to be made. The exposed brick walls lend character, but they lack insulation completely. The open nature of the space allows light to reach deeper into the basement, but it also allows sound to travel without impediment.…

Pardon Our Dust

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By Alyssa Morris Construction progress as 500 Chicon undergoes a renovation – photo by Elizabeth Hackler 500 Chicon, the headquarters of the Texas Society of Architects, is once again undergoing a renovation. Indeed, the building’s history has been characterized by change. What began as an oil company warehouse in the 20s evolved into offices for a design firm, fd2s, and one of the first projects in a wave of revitalization sweeping East Austin. The neighborhood has changed drastically over the past 15 years, and now the office sits squarely in the middle of some of Austin’s trendiest bars and restaurants. The original…

The Old House, and the New

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Simultaneously private and public, houses are particularly charged repositories of aspiration and association. In the best projects, an architect responds to a client’s wishes by designing a work whose integrity is rooted in a frank engagement with the circumstances of daily life, the facts and figures of the commission, and the material and technical possibilities that architecture offers at that moment in time. When these concerns are harnessed by a strong idea and executed by a steady hand confident enough to leave room for the unscripted, the results are often felicitous, and occasionally revolutionary.  Jim Poteet’s renovation of, and addition…