The ‘apocalypse chic’ POST redevelopment pushes ahead
Kirby Liu was in the middle of the biggest development project of his life — remaking the former Barbara Jordan Post Office — when COVID-19 shut down the city’s booming commercial real estate market.
Liu’s project, POST Houston, was under construction on the far north end of downtown, across Buffalo Bayou from the city’s cluster of office and residential towers. Many viewed the location and sheer size of the project as too risky. The success of POST relied on the momentum that had disappeared essentially overnight.
“People dropped off and went radio silent for the months of March and April,” said Liu, Lovett Commercial’s director of development and project manager for the post office project at 401 Franklin St.
Still, as the real estate market was hunkered down, construction on the post office continued. Workers excised giant chunks of the roof to bring light into the cavernous structure. They gutted the old five-story administration building on the site and painted the dingy exterior a bright white. They began the complex process of installing three gargantuan staircases uniquely designed for each section of the low-slung former mail-sorting warehouse.
Today, the basic building structure and mechanical systems are on track to be completed by the end of the year. Theoretically, restaurants, shops and offices could start building out spaces by early next year.
For POST, a project that drew skeptics even in good economic times, there’s no looking back.
“There’s no plan B,” Liu said. “We’re going to push forward.”
Houston-based Lovett Commercial, whose founder, Frank Liu — Kirby’s father— also builds upscale homes and townhomes in the urban core, is redeveloping the 16acre postal property. When completed, the
500,000-square-foot project is expected to house a food hall, office and co-working space, a shopping area and a concert venue.
The company bought the property in 2015 as part of the U.S. Postal Service’s massive selloff of real estate across the country amid its financial troubles.
Kirby Liu said the Houston property wasn’t one of the government’s “crown jewel” post offices. Itwas built in1962 and designed by Wilson Morris Crain& Anderson, a firm behind other local buildings that are not universally adored: the Houston Chronicle building at 4747 Southwest Freeway and the Astrodome.
But the downtown property has provided an opportunity to create something cutting edge and new out of a ’60s institutional relic. Liu referred to it as “apocalypse chic” on a recent tour of the old warehouse that’s been gutted, revealing a gritty, industrial vibe the company plans to capitalize on.
The company hired international architecture firm OMA, founded by Pritzker Prize winner Rem Koolhaas, to design the project, which will have a rooftop park, farm, event space and restaurants.
As Liu’s vision takes shape and more businesses learn how to operate in a pandemic, retail leasing is moving forward again.
“We’re doing a little bit of a victory lap now because a lot of people were like, ‘Tear the building down. It’s so ugly,’ ” Liu said. “I think ugly has its own merits, too.”
The food hall has tentative commitments for about 60 percent of the space. Liu said restaurateurs are attracted to the low initial overhead and smaller spaces. As the landlord, Lovett is absorbing most of the equipment and other buildout costs, meaning the tenants must only pay for things such as signs and décor.
“A lot of chefs and concepts have been shaken loose by this COVID environment and are now planning what to do afterward and howto start back up with a limited amount of startup capital,” he said. “So that’s actually been a net positive for the restaurant community and for us in terms of leasing, because it means that people who were previously committed to fullscale restaurants are now looking at smaller-scale, more strategic placements and concepts.”
Yet there’s farmore todo to convince businesses to move in and customers to visit.
Concerts aren’t coming back any time soon. The office market remains uncertain as work-from-home potentially becomes more permanent for some. The administration building was supposed to be redone as a boutique hotel, but the hospitality industry has cratered.
The pandemic adds other challenges. In a place chiefly designed for people to congregate and collaborate— indoors and out— social distancing wasn’t the intended goal.
Liu said thecompany is working out a plan for spacing and is exploring the use of touchless systems that would reduce contact.
With a development cost in the “high-eight-to-low-nine digits” and current market challenges, POST will likely take years to complete. Future phases could bring greater density in the form of residential and commercial buildings on the sprawling parking lots surrounding the property.
A highlight of the project is expected to be the rooftop. Like the unique spaces inside, the roof will be segmented into zones with landscapes designed to mimic different Texas topographies and plant diversities.
“It’s like the building itself,” Liu said. “It’s not a uniform experience. Every time you move from onespace to another it’s different.”