Museum Tower is now under construction (Dallas: condominiums, buyer, architectural)

[R1070]

I don't think the condo sales in this building are going to be as bad as people are making it out to be and not nearly as bad as people in other cities are hoping it will be so they can say "told you so!"

[Dallaz]

Pics from the 24th of May

15 floors





A Pic from the 26th of May

[Lakewooder]

It already looks very tall from the Woodall Rodgers Deck Park (under construction). And it's only about 1/3 there!

[Trae713]

Originally Posted by R1070

I don't think the condo sales in this building are going to be as bad as people are making it out to be and not nearly as bad as people in other cities are hoping it will be so they can say "told you so!"

I think people just thought the market was too saturated. Probably why they used pension funds for police officers to fund it at first. It's a nice building regardless though. Dallaz, got the link for the units sold? And yes, it does look tall from Woodall already. The museum is getting really big, too.

[Dallaz]

It's almost visible in the skyline.

http://img64.imageshack.us/img64/579/img9854e.jpg (broken link)

[Exult.Q36]

You know that would look good in downtown Fort Worth...Too bad my town is anti scraper. Props to Dallas for thinking big and living large.

[Trae713]

Well, I went and searched myself. This is where Dallaz probably found the units pending/sold/deposits (we don't know what the "54" number is for). At the price points per unit and with all the other condos on the market, it makes it hard for me to believe that it is "54 units sold". Probably deposits. Go down to #1307: Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum - DTD | Arts District: Museum Tower (~560 FT. / 42 ST.) | V2.0

[oil capital]

Originally Posted by Trae713

Well, I went and searched myself. This is where Dallaz probably found the units pending/sold/deposits (we don't know what the "54" number is for). At the price points per unit and with all the other condos on the market, it makes it hard for me to believe that it is "54 units sold". Probably deposits. Go down to #1307: Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum - DTD | Arts District: Museum Tower (~560 FT. / 42 ST.) | V2.0

And that posted number is completely unsubstantiated. IIRC, the poster did not even bother to give his source. Nothing more than an Internet forum rumor at this point.

[Dallaz]

Museum Tower project already stands out on the Dallas skyline

By STEVE BROWN
Real Estate Editor
stevebrown@dallasnews.com
Published 09 June 2011 09:13 PM


Excerpts:

Construction on Dallas’ newest high-rise won’t be done for more than a year.

But already you can tell it’s no ordinary building.

....

It’s arguably one of the most distinctive towers ever to go up in the central business district. And the project’s a standout even in the Arts District, which is known for its eye-catching buildings.

“I think it will surprise people as it goes up,” design architect Scott Johnson said of the 42-story residential high-rise. “It will sparkle like a gem.”

The $200 million building’s shape, size and location created hurdles for developers, designers and the construction companies building it.

....

The project has been more than a decade in the making and has become more elaborate as it went along.

The neighborhood has changed, too.

“When we started planning this project, we didn’t know there would be the Woodall Rodgers park, the Calatrava bridge and the Perot science museum,” said developer John Sughrue of Brook Partners Inc.

All three new downtown-area landmarks are visible from the 16th floor of Museum Tower, where work crews are busy putting up the next level.



Unusual shape

General contractor Austin Commercial is adding more than a floor a week to the high-rise — no two of which are alike.

The building’s elliptical-shaped floors taper out from the ground as the structure goes up.

“The first 18 floors widen,” Sughrue said. “Over 20 floors, it amounts to six or seven feet — it’s very sculptural.”

Then the upper half of the tower will step back to the original ground floor size. The biggest floor will be about 1,000 square feet larger than the penthouse level and the lobby. And the columns on the outside walls actually step out as the floors go up.

....

“We picked a very slender form,” said architect Johnson, who heads Los Angeles-based Johnson Fain. “We are the one tall building in a very interesting neighborhood,” the landmark Arts District.

“It will be a light and buoyant shape.”

The tapering sides of the tower will make it look even taller, he said.

“This is what the Greeks did on their Doric temples,” Johnson said. “At the Parthenon, each column is slightly bowed because it makes the eye read it as a more slender shape.”

....

Museum Tower’s exterior won’t be the mirrored glass or stone wrapper used on most downtown towers.

“I wanted the building to be light,” Johnson said. “Rather than build it out of stone, which is opaque, I wanted glass.”

The condominium high-rise will be clad in 269,000 square feet of energy-efficient glass in overlapping panels. The windows will alternate between tinted “vision” glass and accent glass covered with a dot matrix pattern.

“You get very interesting digital designs,” Sughrue said.

Each of the 5-foot-wide windows is slanted out at the bottom, allowing the panes to overhang the floor below by several inches.

Museum Tower is the tallest project under way by Austin Commercial. And it’s one of less than a handful of skyscrapers being built in the U.S. currently.

“It’s the only one we have right now,” said Steve Fortmeier, senior project manager with Austin Commercial.

....

Other amenities

As with any downtown building, the tight building site and surrounding thoroughfares complicate the construction.

....

Along with the tower, work crews are busy with the underground parking garage and an elevated half-acre park that will include a swimming pool and other amenities.

The north and west sides of the site will eventually be landscaped with dozens of large trees, plantings and lawn.

Each floor of the condo tower will have a maximum of four living units. But the total number of homes in the building has fallen as buyers have combined smaller units.

“Right now we are around 110 units,” Sughrue said. (Note: the number of units at the start of the project was 123, now it is 110 with multiple units having been combined into single units.)

Museum Tower’s developer won’t say how many of the condos — starting at more than $1 million — they’ve actually sold.

“We are on plan,” Sughrue said. “The level of demand we are seeing at this point is surprising.”

....

It’s been almost a year since the formal groundbreaking took place.

....


Full text of article here:

http://www.dallasnews.com/business/c...#ssStory201832 (broken link)

[Dallaz]

Museum Tower now on the 20th floor