Awards
Merit Award for adaptive re-use
The Heritage Society of Austin
Penn Field
PowerBrokers - Top 20 based
on leasing transaction volume
Austin Business Journal
Southwest Strategies Group
Mixed use Commercial real estate winner
Austin Business Journal
Penn Field
Historic Preservation Award
The Heritage Society of Austin
for The Morley Brothers Drug Store (Grove Drug)
2004, READERS POLL, Architecture & Lodging
Austin Chronicle
Best Recently Restored Building
TIE: Harry Ransom Center, Driscoll Villa at Laguna Gloria, Penn Field
Nobody wants to revisit a childhood home to find it’s been replaced
by a convenience store. As it turns out, people don’t feel any better
when it happens to familiar public spaces, either. Our landscape is our
home, and the Penn Field, Harry Ransom Center, and Driscoll Villa renovation
projects have proved that as a familiar landscape changes – be it
updating World War I-era airfield barracks for modern business-use, bringing
more light into the HRC, or restoring Laguna Gloria’s Tuscan villa
to its original 1916 beauty – it can still remain, quintessentially,
Austin.
Press - excerpts from articles - 2008 & 2009
2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 - archived
Let's make a deal
Austin Business Journal
by Kate Harrington
July 24, 2009
Opporunity not yet knocking for all
Now is a good time for those who are well-capitalized tos ave on rentals and purchases, said Daniel Roth, a principal with Southwest Strategies Group. But he said bargain seekers won't always find dramatic 50 percent savings in rental and sales prices that some may hope are out there; such cuts are closer to 10 to 15 percent.
And in many cases, Roth said, this environment has not yielded better deals, particularly in some of the older properties he works with. That may be because their owners bought them with more equity, which Southwest Strategies started doing several years ago, and have the cushion to wait longer.
Highland Mall today ... but what about tomorrow?
Austin Business Journal
by Kate Harrington
April 17-23, 2009
Daniel Roth, Principal
Southwest Strategies Group
"The property could be repurposed, but I don't see it long term as a mall," Roth said. "The question is what would it be in its new purpose. Our specialty, and I think something a lot of people would look at, is mixed-use – maybe with retail pushed to the edges.
... We're the home of state, county and city government, and lots of public education facilities. If it was handed to me tomorrow, I'd be approaching all those entities as well as retailers and residential."
Crestview Station and Mueller are models for the type of mixed-use development that could occupy the Highland Mall site, he said.
01_Adaptive Reuse
Four preservation projects -- a barn, a grain elevator, a nurses' dormitory, and a power plant -- show that repurposing old buildings for new uses needn't sacrifice soul.
The ArchitectsNewspaper
http://www.archpaper.com/e-board_rev.asp?News_ID=3395
April 15, 2009
Seaholm
Austin, Texas
Ayers Saint Gross
On a prominent site separating a booming downtown residential district from Town Lake, the Seaholm Power Plant, built in the 1950s, is one of Austin’s most distinctive midcentury structures. Its red neon sign, towering stacks, and stark concrete mass are immediately recognizable landmarks. So when it was decommissioned in 1996, and following a nine-year remediation of hazardous materials, the city drafted a redevelopment masterplan and issued an RFQ to develop the site.
The winning team, including Southwest Strategies Group and Baltimore architects Ayers Saint Gross (ASG), programmed the site for new high- and low-rise construction to house a mix of office, residential, hospitality, and special-event space. The Seaholm building itself, with its cavernous turbine hall ringed by high clerestory windows, was envisioned as a retail center. “The model is the Ferry Building Marketplace in San Francisco,” said Ann Powell of ASG.
Travis may join city in Seaholm taxing district
Austin American-Statesman
http://www.statesman.com/search/content/news/stories/local/04/15/0415seaholm.html
by Suzannah Gonzales
April 15, 2009
Travis County commissioners, lured by the prospect of gaining hundreds of thousands of dollars in tax revenue, voted Tuesday to advise the City of Austin that they're willing to join a taxing district to help redevelop the former Seaholm Power Plant.
Seaholm currently generates no tax money because the property is owned by the city, but officials hope the site on West Cesar Chavez Street will become a $117 million mix of shops, offices and condominiums and will include a boutique hotel and special-events space.
... The proposed structure of the (Seaholm financing district) is for the proceeds to help offset the costs of the redevelopment of the power plant, addition of a plaza and transportation improvements," said John Rosato, lead developer of Seaholm Power LLC, which is spearheading the redevelopment.
416 Congress for sale
126-year-old building never changed hands; pitched as a 'piece of Texas history'
Austin Business Journal
by Kate Harrington
April 10-16, 2009
The building is being marketed for sale by the family, members of which declined to comment. John Rosato, a principal with Austin-based Southwest Strategies Group, who is representing the owners, said the family started talking about selling the building late last year.
... "Anyone who buys it will probably want a piece of Texas history," Rosato said.
Planned Seaholm Development puts retired power plant to different use
Community Impact Newspaper
http://www.impactnews.com/central-austin/news/3909-planned-seaholm-development-puts-retired-power-plant-to-different-use
by Mark Collins
April 10, 2009
For nearly 40 years the Seaholm Power Plant on Cesar Chavez provided energy for residents. Now on the verge of a major transformation, the power plant will serve Austin in a completely different capacity.
...
“It is one of the most interesting spaces I’ve ever been in, and I’m a 69-year-old architect that has traveled the world and seen a lot of spaces,” Black said. “I’ve never seen a space more interesting than the inside of that building; it really is a magnificent thing inside.”
... “We were very intrigued by the power plant and spent a tremendous amount of time there,” lead developer John Rosato said. “That has been the main purpose of our design team — figuring out how we take an industrial site and convert the building into retail and offices while maintaining its character.”
City, developer are near Seaholm deal
Proposal calls for Austin to pay 16 percent of $117.2 million mixed-use project downtown
by Kate Miller Morton
Austin American-Statesman
March 28, 2008
The City of Austin and the local group it chose to redevelop the Seaholm Power Plant and surrounding property three years ago are close to reaching an agreement that would allow the $117.2 million project to move forward.
... Rosato hopes the group will be able to start construction by this time next year. If that happens, construction could be completed in 2011.
Turning the Old into the New and Avant Garde
Redevelopment of Seaholm site a long time in coming, but it was worth the wait
Business District - The Real Estate Issue
September, 2007
SHBusArticle.PDF
For years – almost two decades, in fact – the Seaholm power plant that reigns over the Southwest portion of Austin's downtown sector just across the street from Lady Bird Lake and the hike and bike trail sat silent and seemingly immune to the hustle and bustle and change of the world around it.
That's all about to change, and many will say that change is a good thing and a long time coming.
... The right team at the right time
According to Laura Huffman, the assistant city manager for the City of Austin, the determining factors in awarding the site to the current developer was its team's qualifications, including its experience with similar projects and the resources they could bring to the project.
ILLUMINATION
A new site-specific aerial dance from Blue Lapis Light
Where: The Seaholm Power Plant, downtown Austin
(Entrance at 3rd Street & West Ave.)
Dates: October 4-7, 11-14, 18-21, 25-28
Time: 8pm
Blue Lapis Light presents its latest site-specific aerial dance performance, Illumination, at the Seaholm Power Plant in downtown Austin. Artistic Director and recent Austin Arts Hall of Fame inductee Sally Jacques, along with choreographers/dancers Laura Cannon and Nicole Whiteside, will transform the interior of the historic building to create images of beauty and transcendence. The architecture of Seaholm, reminiscent of a cathedral, inspires the vision for Illumination. The dancers, suspended from ropes and cloth, will soar through the space in graceful athleticism. Highlighting the grand architecture, Illumination will feature lighting by Jason Amato and sound design by William Meadows.
Illumination has been made possible with great assistance from various departments of the City of Austin and Southwest Strategies Group Inc.
Missing a Longtime 6th Street Advocate
the 6ixth
Pecan Street Owners Association
September 6, 2007
Jerry Creagh, a founding member of the Pecan Street Owners Association, passed away this summer after battling cancer. Jerry was the longtime owner of "Wiley's Restaurant" on East 6th Street and was a prominent force in the development and success of the 6th Street district.
... Jerry was a well respected business man in the community and was a partner in Southwest Strategies, a commercial development firm.
Alamo Cinema Drafthouse
Karrie & Tim League owners
in a speech by Karrie March, 2007
"Danny Roth especially. We met him 11 years ago. When we approached him with no business cards or business plan and pitched him our hare-brained scheme, he treated us with total professional courtesy, just as if we really had financial backing and a tried-and-true business model. He was responsible for getting us our first lease, and he has been behind every new theater we have tackled since the first."
Austin to see Seaholm Plans
In $100 million project downtown, developers seek to blend new, old buildings
Austin American-Statesman
February 1, 2007
Developers are expected to roll out today their vision for a mixed-use project that would transform the former Seaholm Power Plant into shops, offices, a hotel and condominiums by 2009.
... "This is a historic event and an opportunity for saving a slice of Austin's history, " said John Rosato, managing partner of Seaholm Power LLC. "It's the first time that the city has entered into a public-private venture for the sole purpose of saving an iconic building in Austin."
Assistant City Manager Laura Huffman said, "We view this as a pivotal opportunity for revitalizing downtown and realizing a longtime goal for a transit hub at Seaholm."
... Centro would develop the condos. Units could cost from about $450,000 fpr abpit 1,200 square feet to more than $1 million for the largest 3,000-square-foot units, Rosato said.
Jeff Trigger, ex-managing director of the historic Driskill Hotel in downtown Austin, would oversee the construction, management and operations of the Seaholm Plaza Hotel, to be built just north of the former power plant, through La Corsha, his newly formed hotel management and consulting firm.
Alamo Drafthouse moving to Sixth St.
The historic Ritz will be a theater again, a change cheered by area business leaders
Austin American-Statesman
by Shonda Novak & Chris Garcia
March 21, 2007
The Drafthouse's longtime real estate broker, Danny Roth, Southwest Strategies Group, and the Downtown Austin Alliance, which represents downtown property owners, helped put the deal together.
A sense of history
Austin Business Journal
Book of Power 2007 issue
Dec. 29-Jan. 4, 2007
For more than two decades, Jeff Trigger has been in the business of managing, restoring and renovating hotels. And in that time, Trigger has often been approached often by hotel companies interested in tapping his hospitality expertise.
... Trigger's La Corsha, along with Southwest Strategies Group Inc. and Centro Partners LLC, make up Seaholm Power LLC, the group that's transforming the historic art-deco Seaholm Power Plant site downtown.
..."To me, it's neat to be able to preserve history in a sense of place," Trigger says. "Seaholm is a very special project, and that location is screaming for a community-oriented facility. Once completed, the hotel will be downtown Austin's only independent luxury hotel. And there will be plenty of green space. We're hoping it will become the place to be in the downtown neighborhood. And, of course, the icon of the smokestacks is just phenomenal."
2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 - archived
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