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Jones Plaza
Site Analysis
Jones Plaza Site Analysis
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Lancaster Hotel
1926
Italian immigrant and real estate investor
Michele DeGeorge built his hotel directly
across from the Municipal Auditorium (now
Jesse H. Jones Hall)
He chose his friend, Houston architect Joseph
Finger, to design the twelve-story building
with two-hundred-rooms
By the 1970s, the hotel had begun to show its
age. After an extensive, multimillion-dollar
renovation in the early 1980s, it reopened as
Houston’s first small luxury hotel.
The hotel’s ninety-three rooms and suites are
decorated with plaids and floral-patterned
English fabrics. Much of the furniture is
antique reproduction. The private baths
feature wraparound mirrors, brass fixtures,
and white Italian marble tile floors, walls, and
vanities.
Historic Hotels of Texas By Liz Carmack page 59-61
Alley Theatre
1969
Designed by: Ulrich Franzen and Associates with MacKie
and Kamrath
Provides audiences with the highest quality theatre,
offering a wide variety of work including new plays,
classics, the re-discovered and the rarely-performed, and
new musical theatre, with an emphasis on new American
works
75,000 square foot facility consists of two stages – the
824 seat Hubbard Stage and the 310 seat Neuhaus Stage
Alley Theatre Renovations - Atop a fourteen- story
parking garage abutting the theatre in downtown
Houston, the five-story Alley Theatre Center for Theatre
Production includes massive rooms for creating sets (56foot ceiling), costumes and props, alongside three new
rehearsal spaces. The Center also houses the Alley's
artistic, production and administrative offices as well as a
boardroom, staff cantina, script library and archive room.
Client: Alley Theatre
Location: Houston, Texas
Size: 75,000 sf
Date: 2003
Architect: Ziegler Cooper Architects/Morris Architects
Jesse H. Jones Hall
1966
Designed by the Houston-based architectural firm
Caudill Rowlett Scott,
the hall, which takes up an entire city block,
features a white Italian marble exterior with eightstory tall columns.
The interior includes a basement and a subbasement which houses a rehearsal room. The
lobby is dominated by a 60-foot (18 m) high ceiling
featuring a massive hanging bronze sculpture by
Richard Lippold entitled "Gemini II".
The inside of the concert hall itself is unique in that
the ceiling is comprised of 800 hexagonal segments
which can be raised or lowered to change the
acoustics of the hall. The segments can actually be
lowered enough to close the upper balcony, so the
seating capacity therefore fluctuates from about
2,300 with the balcony covered to 2,911 with the
balcony open.
The building won the 1967 American Institute of
Architects' Honor Award, which is bestowed on
only one building annually.
http://www.houstontx.gov/joneshall/index.htm
Pennzoil Place
1975
Two 36-story trapezoidal towers at 495 f (150.8 m)
Designed by Philip Johnson
placed ten feet apart and sheathed in dark bronze glass
and aluminum. The buildings are mirror images of each
other. The entire street-level plaza joining the two
structures is enclosed in a 115-foot (35 m) glass pyramidshaped atrium. Deliberately designed as an optical
illusion, Pennzoil Place's appearance will vary depending
on the different locations from where it is viewed.
Pennzoil Place is Houston's most award-winning
skyscraper and is widely known for its innovative design.
Architect Philip Johnson was awarded the 1978 AIA Gold
Medal and became the first laureate of the Pritzker Prize
in Architecture in 1979 for his work on Pennzoil Place.
Pennzoil Place was named "Building of the Decade" in
1975 by New York Times architecture critic Ada Louise
Huxtable because of the dramatic silhouette it added to
the Houston skyline
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennzoil_Place
Bank of America Center
1984
56 stories high
51st tallest building in the United States and is the
seventh tallest building in Texas.
One of the first significant examples of
postmodern architecture
Designed by Philip Johnson and partner John
Burgee
It is a reminiscent of the Dutch Gothic architecture
of canal houses in The Netherlands. The tower was
developed by and is owned by Hines Interests.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_of_America_Center_(Houston)
Bayou Place Expansion, Phase II
Developer: The Cordish Company (international
commercial real-estate development company)
Bayou Place is a large multilevel building that is
home to full service restaurants, pubs, live music,
billiards, multiple theatres and art house films.
The Houston Verizon Wireless Theater stages a
variety of live concerts and the eight-screen
Angelika Theater presents the latest in art, foreign
and independent films.
http://www.houstondowntown.com/Home/GeneralInfo/About/Development/