Houston's ugliest buildings (Dallas, Center, Howe: 2009, lofts, condo)

[joejitsu]

Found this article. Feel free to add your input. Sorry about it being 3 pages.

Architecture Gone Awry: Houston's 8 Ugliest Buildings - Houston News - Hair Balls

[texas7]

I liked the Federal Reserve and Sacred Heart. La Luz del Mundo should be number 1 on that list and I do agree it belongs. I was on 59 yesterday and saw this sore thumb sticking out. The old, dilapidated hotel scores a number 1 as well. The 2016 Main hi-rise is also fairly ugly and not on the list.

[jluke65780]

They picked some really bad choices; some of those buildings are quite unique. However, I agree with the AT&T building. It seems that pick a couple of buildings that aren't exactly amazing, but not too hideous either.

[tstone]

Yeah, Mercer Tower... that's definitely my #1 choice. Such a sore thumb sticking out in the Galleria skyline.

[AK123]

The Memorial Hermann at Memorial City is a new one people either love or hate, generally. I'm still kind of on the fence about it, but think it looked better in renderings than it actually turned out... seems ill-thought out in some respects. For some really great looking hospitals, the Medical Center is the place to go look.

I don't think the others shown in the article are ugly, with the exception of the HCC, AT&T and Holiday Inn buildings. Those are really bad.

[jfre81]

Hm.....let's dig through the ol' archives for some honorable mentions.



Of course the older, smaller one is history now. For some reason I kind of like the newer, taller one but I seem to be the only one. Just wait until 60s architecture becomes "classic." This building will probably still be around then.



How about this er, interesting condo building (Rise Lofts) in Midtown?



The building with the corner store on Main@Walker could use, like, some windows or something. (Little Houston history lesson - the original James Coney Island was at this site.)



Brutalist architecture - love it or hate it. Then again this is probably better described as brutalist-inspired or something like that. This is in the Medical Center, part of Memorial Hermann IIRC.



There's loads of these scattered around town but I'm not a huge fan. This one's on Quitman Street in the Near North Side just east of 45.







And then there's the Central Bank building, conspicuous by its heretofore absence from the discussion. I kind of don't like picking on abandoned buildings when there are so many in-use contenders around.

[Oildog]

Nice pix

[hsw]

Part of why I admire Houston (or Dallas or Chicago) is that these more capitalist towns are more willing to just tear-down dumpy bldgs and build new stuff (w/modern HVAC/computer tech, undergd garages, etc) if bldg occupies (now) valuable land/location

NYC and SF could learn much from Houston's approach to solving mistakes and inevitable obsolescence

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by hsw

Part of why I admire Houston (or Dallas or Chicago) is that these more capitalist towns are more willing to just tear-down dumpy bldgs and build new stuff

....which is why we have the old Holiday Inn and Central Bank buildings hovering over the Pierce Elevated. Am I right guys?

[crbcrbrgv]

Originally Posted by jfre81

....which is why we have the old Holiday Inn and Central Bank buildings hovering over the Pierce Elevated. Am I right guys?

Indeed you are. And as a non-native I think I speak for many when I say that the Astrodome is one of the ugliest buildings in Houston. Either spruce it up a lot or tear the damned thing down. Worse yet, it's next to one of the most amazing NFL stadiums.