The interior courtyard is a charming feature of the townhouse.

Two-story high ceilings in the foyer provide oodles of light.

The 18-foot ceilings in the living room offer a spacious feel in the space thatoverlooks the interior courtyard.

A balcony view of the living room.

The completely remodeled kitchen is spacious and beautifully up-to-date.

The formal dining room.

Entry to the townhouse is via a shaded, paved walkway.

Monsour Taghdisi, president of Prestige Builders Inc., builds to benefit LegacyCommunity Health Services.

Lucinda Loya of Lucinda Loya Interiors will design the interiors.

A rendering of Prestige Builders' Nantucket Showcase home, designed byMiller/Dahlstrand Architects.

Dillon House towers over Andy Weaver and Lucinda Cobley's Montrose bungalow."It's like having a cruise ship next door," he says.

The Post Oak School purchased and tore down an old home at the corner of Autreyand Montrose for a parking lot.

The Post Oak School renovated an industrial building, right, for a high schoolthat opens in August. Some residents are worried about increased traffic;officials insist they want to be good neighbors.

Plans for the Ashby high rise have focused attention on Houston's planning — orthe lack of it.

“We have generations of South Americans and Mexicans who have an affinity forVail," says Alex Iskenderian ofVail Resorts Development of Colorado. Pictured isArrabelle at Vail Square.

A new trend is the emergence of urban timeshare-like residences in cities suchas San Antonio.

What’s the next hot market? The Tuscany region of Italy (shown here) andFrance’s Provence.

In its prime, the Astrodome was considered an engineering feat.

Judge Ed Emmett compared the iconic stadium to the Eiffel Tower.

Royal Sonesta in New Orleans

Staybridge Suites near The Galleria

The Imperial Sugar Land development has a new tenant: The Children's Museum ofHouston.

The museum is hoping to raise $1 million from Fort Bend residents by October of2013.

A 10,000 square foot warehouse tucked behind the iconic sugar silos will be hometo six exhibition spaces in 2015.

The Houston Independent School District Board must decide by August whether the$1.89 billion bond will be put to Houston voters.

Included in the package is approximately $80 million for a new High School forthe Performing and Visual Arts facility in downtown that will replace thecurrent Montrose-area building.

The house sits on a large lot that backs up to a tributary of Sims Bayou andlooks across to Glenwood Golf Course.

The great room enjoys high ceilings, a working fireplace and palladian-stylecaps above French doors.

The view from the front yard of the house built in the 1990s.

The breakfast area off of the modern kitchen is a charming space.

The updated kitchen offers plenty of storage.

The sleeping porch with several ceiling fans is an unusual feature of the house.

The dining room overlooks the great room.

Baths have been updated.

The guest bedroom has a view to the golf course fairways.

Much of the building is currently vacant.

We're anxious to see what PM Realty Group has in store for 1011 Westheimer.

BB's owner Brooks Bassler

The former Laurier Café and Wine space will soon house a new BB's Café.

BB's signature shrimp po' boy

The 1,800 square foot apartment overlooking New York's Hudson River was stagedfor an open house by Houston's Lucinda Loya.

Two days was all the time allotted to dress up the $2.25 million apartment, thestudy seen here.

Lucinda and Javier Loya at the open house in Tribeca.

Halstead real estate agents Julie Cushman, left, and Ivana Tagliamonte were allsmiles at the decorative results.

Anna Robinson, from left, Alton LaDay and Mary Catherine McGarvey at the openhouse. The women own McGarvey Robinson Design, based in Brooklyn.

This marks the return of the freshly-restored metal letters on vintage AlabamaTheatre sign.

The narrow and hot confines of the vintage metal sign have not made it easy forlighting workers, who hope to complete the project by Friday afternoon.

As of Thursday afternoon, new neon was in place at the top of the spire andthroughout the lettering.

The vintage letters have a fresh coat of orage and white paint.

Each of these small electrical boxes weigh more than 30 pounds — a heavy loadconsidering how high workers need to carry them up the four-story sign. Oh yeah. . . and there are about 40 of them to be installed.

Inside, the original Art Deco decorations have been reattached.

Fresh neon lights awaiting installation.

The main corridor along the south wall has been dry-walled.

Sets of pink and turquiose railing are stacked in the rear foyer.

A small outdoor shelter is nearing completion.

Original neon stands sag at the rear parking lot entrance, waiting to be eitherremoved or replaced.

This Andy Abercrombie custom home resembles a Mediterranean resort and indeedthe feel is all luxury.

The combo billiard room and study provides a rich retreat from the open spacesof the remainder of the house.

The front gate leads down a curving drive paved in a herring-bone pattern ofbrick.

The two-story living room with working fireplace offers a grand setting forsophisticated socializing.

The lanai expands the total entertaining space of the house.

The second working fireplace in the summer kitchen presents and alternativeentertaining space.

The spacious master bedroom overlooks the back garden and pool.

The majestic structure rises from the grounds at the foot of the curvingdriveway.

The formal dining room opens to the two-story high foyer.

The family room exudes a homey warmth even in its spaciousness.

The sunken wine room is large enough for dinner.

The open plan kitchen flows from the family room to the bar that connects to theliving room.

The line to get into the new Trader Joe's in The Woodlands stretched around thestore on opening day.

Trader Joe's fever was in the crowd.

Once you got to the front of the Trader Joe's line, greeters were there with atouch worthy of Hawaii.

There wasn't a lot of room to move around on the opening day of the new TraderJoe's in The Woodlands.

Getting to the front of the checkout was no easy task as Trader Joe's frenzyovertook The Woodlands.

Still, many customers left satisified — with wine.

Toby Keith

Interior of the Toby Keith's bar location in Oklahoma City

Steaks and burgers

The I Love This Bar & Grill in Oklahoma City

Jared Lang and associates pick up the gilded shovels at the Southwest Freewaysite between Greenbrier and Shepherd.

Jared Lang, Momentum Audi GM, welcomes guests to the groundbreaking of themonumental dealership.

Fred Goree, from left, Mohammed Oshiba, and Steven Craney of Goree Architects,which is designing the 170,000 square foot structure.

How can you not love a city that has a Ferris wheel right downtown?

I can get nearly any place in record time from my new house including TheGalleria in 15 minutes.

The Beer Can House is just one pretty cool attraction to see.

Memorial Park is now a perfect five-minute walk away.

Some builders have considered turning the Imperial Sugar silos — which areiconic, though not historic — into condos.

The first floor of the historic char house would make a perfect lobby for aboutique hotel.

The facade of the three-bay warehouse looks out onto a large plaza.

The house, built in 1925, was completely renovated in a massive three-yearproject.

The pool pavilion was an architecurally-sensitive addition to the updatedproperty.

Wide plank chestnut flooring from France is used throughout much of the house asseen here in the living room. Note the 18th century mantel.

The library addition at the back of the house continues the esthetics of theoriginal structure..

The meditation garden adjoins the original sun room.

Light pours in through mullioned windows in the master bedroom.

The kitchen opens to the large family room across the way, which overlooks thepool through French doors.

Each of the five bedrooms is light an airy.

A view from the stairway into the entry and living room.

The developers of Cross Creek Ranch decided to go sustainable in itslandscaping, land development and water usage. Wildflowers replaced standardcarpet grass.

The development is now ranked in the top 10 communities for new home sales inthe Houston area.

The curves of the land’s natural creek had been straightened for efficiency’ssake, the grass was pounded into submission by cattle and the property wasbarren, without trees.

The community’s parks and picnic areas that do have Bermuda grass are wateredwith recycled gray water.

The final plan for the Imperial Sugar Land development was approved in April.

The city of Sugar Land was built up around the Imperial Sugar Company mill andrefinery.

Curb appeal runs high for this bungalow in the East Lawn, just minutes fromdowntown.

The living room features the original fireplace and original floor-to-ceilingmullioned windows.

The living room looks into the dining room.

Plenty of light pours through the windows into the formal dining room.

The kitchen has been updated and new appliances added.

The kitchen is large enough for a breakfast nook, a rarity in houses of thisera.

The master bedroom is large enough to comfortably house a king-size bed and anarmoire.

The guest bedroom is all charm.

The third floor attic space makes for a comfortable TV room

Across the stairwell from the TV room, there is space for an office on one endand a bed on the other.

Both bathrooms have been updated.