Hines Bullish on Houston

Montrose boutique hotel partners with Hines for upgrade and luxury residential high-rise

Montrose boutique hotel La Colombe d'Or set to undergo a $10 million renovation and the addition of a 34-story residential tower.

At a time when some developers are backing off high-rise residential projects, others are moving ahead, planning to open new doors in sync with Houston's anticipated economic recovery. Hines is the latest to announce a luxury tower, this one connected to the storied La Colombe d'Or boutique hotel on Montrose Boulevard.

Hotel owner Steve Zimmerman and Hines announced Tuesday the partnership that will result in a $10 million expansion and renovation of the hotel and the addition of a 34-story, 285-unit tower to be known as the Residences at La Colombe d'Or. The project is a joint venture between Hines, the Zimmerman family and TIAA Gobal Asset Management.

The tower will rise just behind the hotel, replacing the parking lot and the ballroom that was a later addition to the mansion, built in 1923. The residences will connect to the hotel through "a series of amenitized areas," including an art gallery and an outdoor space with a fireplace. In addition, the new building will provide 17 luxury rooms for La Colombe d'Or hotel guests.

“La Colombe d’Or is one of those unique Houston gems that makes our city so special,” Hines founder and chairman Gerald D. Hines said in a statement. “We look forward to working hand-in-hand with the Zimmerman family to be a part of the next chapter in the legacy of this celebration of enriched living.”

Construction will begin in the second quarter of 2017 with completion expected in 2020.

“There are no multifamily assets of this quality slated to compete with the opening of La Colombe d’Or, and the timing of this luxury development takes full advantage of that,” according to a statement by Tom Melody of JLL, which represented Hines and Zimmerman in the transaction. “When the Residences at La Colombe d’Or delivers, it will be unrivaled by any other product of this quality in the asset class.”

For those emotionally attached to the ballroom, which is elegantly dressed in oak panels from a 300-year-old French chateau and laced with crystal chandeliers, Zimmerman assures that a ballroom with those amenities will be rebuilt at a neighboring location.

The 31-story Hanover Montrose luxury apartment, immediately north of La Colombe d'Or, is now accepting renters and offering up to eight weeks free rent. The Hines/Zimmerman are betting that by 2020, there will be no need for that kind of rental incentive.

hotels high-rises luxury

BY THE NUMBERS

Houston maintains its top 3 position on ranking of cities that best attract biz

Photo via Getty Images

For the third year in a row, Houston ranked high on the list of major metros attracting new business.

According to a recent report, Houston is still one of the top cities in the United States for attracting new companies.

The ranking, which was researched and published by Site Selection Magazine, found that the Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land region attracted 255 business projects last year. This put the metro in the third place of the list that analyzed larger regions.

It's the third year in third place for Houston, and the city had a year over year improvement in number of deals; 2021 reported 213 new business projects in Houston. In fact, the top three cities – Chicago, Dallas, and Houston, respectively — has remained the same for all three years. For 2022, the Chicago metro garnered 448 projects, while Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington reportedly had 426 projects.

The report also called out a recent statistic from Kastle Systems, which was based on building access control data. The stat found that among 10 major cities analyzed based on the week of February, Houston was one of three metros that had a returned-worker percentages higher than 50 percent.

According to the Greater Houston Partnership data, new business accounted for more than 50 percent of business announcements in 2022. GHP's data varied from Site Selection's due to a difference in reporting methods, but the organization's research identified 199 new business announcements in the Houston area in 2022.

The NBAs included new businesses, HQ announcements, and expansions. The GHP data included information about these deals' industry verticals — and the manufacturing sector accounted for almost a third of the total NBAs in 2022.

The GHP also rounded up a few of the most prominent deals reported in their data. According to the Partnership, more details about these NBAs include:

Orsted — an offshore wind developer from Denmark is expanding its presence in Texas by establishing a new office in The Woodlands. The move is expected to create up to 100 jobs in the region.
Syzygy Plasmonics — a Houston-based energy 2.0 company is expanding its operations to Pearland. The new location will serve as HQ, R&D, and manufacturing for its deep-decarbonization platform, creating up to 120 jobs.
Alfred Talke Logistic Services — a German logistics firm is establishing a new facility in the region, serving as its U.S. headquarters. This project represents a $25 million investment and will create 240 jobs.

Trevor Best, co-founder and CEO of Syzygy, first discussed the company's expansion last year on the Houston Innovators Podcast.

"What we're seeing is the market's appetite for our kind of technology — deep tech for decarbonization in energy and chemicals — is really high. If we want to meet global demand for our product, we need to get ready to scale," he says on the show.

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