Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum

looks like it has topped out and they working on the top floor, roof area

The latest views of Harwood's Swexan Hotel's construction progress. About 1/4 of the facade has been completed. You can see the opening on the top floor's roof.

This is a good little small lot infill project.

Is there anyway we can change the name of this thread? Officially, according to Harwoods website, this is not Harwood No. 12.

Is it just me or is the final product going to be a considerable deviation from the final renderings that were published? It doesn’t look like the horizontal/vertical ledges are there and will be mainly a glass exterior. Maybe I’m way off.

It doesn’t look bad though. I think the final project will be nice.

Dallas12 wrote:Is it just me or is the final product going to be a considerable deviation from the final renderings that were published? It doesn’t look like the horizontal/vertical ledges are there and will be mainly a glass exterior. Maybe I’m way off.

No, you're right. This is not at all the same building as in the renderings. Harwood strikes again with sexy renderings and a turd of a finished project. This may be the worst one yet...worse even than St. Anne, and that's saying something.

eburress wrote:

Dallas12 wrote:Is it just me or is the final product going to be a considerable deviation from the final renderings that were published? It doesn’t look like the horizontal/vertical ledges are there and will be mainly a glass exterior. Maybe I’m way off.

No, you're right. This is not at all the same building as in the renderings. Harwood strikes again with sexy renderings and a turd of a finished project. This may be the worst one yet...worse even than St. Anne, and that's saying something.

No joke. And are they really going to call this hotel The Swexan? Gag.

I find the fact that most of the South side of the hotel is blocked with no rooms. The loss of rooms & potential upgrades of views of Downtown Dallas is astounding. Frankly, I don't get it. Also, it's now a dark glass building, which is nothing like it was supposed to be according to the renderings. Very strange hotel.

rono3849 wrote:I find the fact that most of the South side of the hotel is blocked with no rooms. The loss of rooms & potential upgrades of views of Downtown Dallas is astounding. Frankly, I don't get it. Also, it's now a dark glass building, which is nothing like it was supposed to be according to the renderings. Very strange hotel.

I could be wrong, but I think the way this hotel is situated it wouldn't really have any views of DT. I think the back of this basically would look right into McKinney & Olive, and some additional buildings would actually block the view. But at the very least, it definitely is not turning out like any of the renderings!

Man... How we've gotten from this ^ to this v is hard to fathom.

!! Not to mention the prior, far more exciting, iteration.

eburress wrote:

Man... How we've gotten from this ^ to this v is hard to fathom.

These two buildings have totally different facades. One is white, the other is dark glass. I'd like to know what the catalyst was to change it.

Its also not anywhere near finished...

cowboyeagle05 wrote:Its also not anywhere near finished...

Yeah, it's the same 15 or 16 panes of glass across the end that appear in the rendering. The external louvers have no structural function so they could be mounted on the outside later this year.

The glass is too opaque if the aesthetic of the original rendering was the goal.

Harwood Hotel to the left, The Link to the right

Good God that garage is massive.

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Harwood just can't seem to ever do it in a cool or imaginative way. Ah yes, the old 'eff-up' a wet dream. If all we can ever say is "it's better than nothing" or "at least that's one less parking lot" than I will no longer EVER let myself get excited about 90% of these rendering orgies. Yuk!

citygeek wrote:Harwood just can't seem to ever do it in a cool or imaginative way. Ah yes, the old 'eff-up' a wet dream. If all we can ever say is "it's better than nothing" or "at least that's one less parking lot" than I will no longer EVER let myself get excited about 90% of these rendering orgies. Yuk!

I've been saying that Harwood is mediocre for years. Always have been, always will be

citygeek wrote:Harwood just can't seem to ever do it in a cool or imaginative way. Ah yes, the old 'eff-up' a wet dream. If all we can ever say is "it's better than nothing" or "at least that's one less parking lot" than I will no longer EVER let myself get excited about 90% of these rendering orgies. Yuk!

Well stated. Thank you.

Harwood: Ok give me your best design possible..

Architect: Awesome.. Here you go!

Hardwood: WOW! AMAZING! ...Now remove 75% of the Design. Less Design more Tissue Box..You feel me?

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Wow, what truly bland building. It's an unappealing hotel. I still don't understand why an entire side of the tower is all concrete. Frankly, this one is one big ugly fail, IMO.

This would be consistent with Harwood.

kingpin wrote:Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Thanks for the photos kingpin!
This side in the photo above has had my interest for a long while, not just because of the concrete structural system decision made (as you can see from Olive St. between M&O and The Ritz complex in the photo), but, because it piques my curiosity about the future of 2525 McKinnon. It's certainly a viable and reasonably marketable office building, relatively young, but, certainly "disposable". With the Harwood Hotel not focusing much on the side facing 2525 McKinnon with rentable rooms except near the corners up and down (as it seems to appear anyway), any taller redevelopment of 2525 McKinnon really wouldn't downgrade views very badly at all - less sad pandas. Coincidentally, Jihane Boury who used to be at Harwood Int'l for ages happens to be at Colliers International who I believe is in charge of leasing 2525 McKinnon. Small world.

rono3849 wrote:I still don't understand why an entire side of the tower is all concrete.

I'm not familiar with the parcel. Is that side built up against a property line, as opposed to a street? If so it's likely a fire code issue.

It is very close to 2525 McKinnon, and, a good point. The gap is strikingly close as viewed from Harwood St. I walked through it during the early days of construction.

From quite some time ago:

kingpin wrote:Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr
Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

Untitled by rlopez2011, on Flickr

It’s a good little infill project. Maybe more ornamental design elements will be added at the end to spice it up a little.

This building is so Harwood

Oh boy Dallas. Another glass box. Very original.... Why does Harwood even bother with their pretense of interesting renderings and images that make it seem that they could actually create something beautiful when it always turns into this crap? And that next one they are working on, 'the tallest in Uptown' -- "Would you like some office space with your parking garage, Sir?"

citygeek wrote:Oh boy Dallas. Another glass box. Very original.... Why does Harwood even bother with their pretense of interesting renderings and images that make it seem that they could actually create something beautiful when it always turns into this crap? And that next one they are working on, 'the tallest in Uptown' -- "Would you like some office space with your parking garage, Sir?"

BTW, what happened to that "tallest in Uptown" building? I guess that has joined the two hotel projects in the dust bin. I see a trend developing.

I'm no expert by any means, but by looking at the last rendering again, the tower does mostly appear to be a glass box underneath the staggered levels. It looks like whatever outer vertical/horizontal material between each floor gradually increases in size as it goes up higher, giving it the illusion that it's not a glass box. It'll probably look more like the rendering once they start attaching the ledges (or whatever they're called) between floors.

Still not sure about the glass, though. Maybe they discovered after the fact that the original glass color glared like Museum Tower's glass during a certain time of day/year?

maconahey wrote:I'm no expert by any means, but by looking at the last rendering again, the tower does mostly appear to be a glass box underneath the staggered levels. It looks like whatever outer vertical/horizontal material between each floor gradually increases in size as it goes up higher, giving it the illusion that it's not a glass box. It'll probably look more like the rendering once they start attaching the ledges (or whatever they're called) between floors.

Still not sure about the glass, though. Maybe they discovered after the fact that the original glass color glared like Museum Tower's glass during a certain time of day/year?

At this point, I'll take Museum Tower mirror death rays if it means a slightly nicer looking building from Kleene- I mean Harwood...

maconahey wrote:I'm no expert by any means, but by looking at the last rendering again, the tower does mostly appear to be a glass box underneath the staggered levels. It looks like whatever outer vertical/horizontal material between each floor gradually increases in size as it goes up higher, giving it the illusion that it's not a glass box. It'll probably look more like the rendering once they start attaching the ledges (or whatever they're called) between floors.

Still not sure about the glass, though. Maybe they discovered after the fact that the original glass color glared like Museum Tower's glass during a certain time of day/year?

So basically we might want to wait until the building is complete before critiquing the outcome.

I have glass fatigue.

Crane coming down today.

I have a very good view of this project from where I live and notably, over the last many weeks, there has been seemingly very little activity there. At the most I can see a handful of workers on site and very little progress being made. And I can see through the glass on the upper floors where it doesn't look like things are moving much at all.

Might as well have pictures.
These are from Saturday:





https://twitter.com/CTroyMathis/status/ ... 6795927561

...So did they not want to pay the architect their full rate to finish designing that last corner? This is supposed to be high end?

R1070 wrote:It doesn’t look bad though. I think the final project will be nice.

Your prognostication seems unlikely at this point..

Tivo_Kenevil wrote:

R1070 wrote:It doesn’t look bad though. I think the final project will be nice.

Your prognostication seems unlikely at this point..

The finished hotel looks nothing like the pre-development renderings. It's just a bland box with nothing remarkable to make it stand out at all.

rono3849 wrote:The finished hotel looks nothing like the pre-development renderings. It's just a bland box with nothing remarkable to make it stand out at all.

Par for the course with Harwood. I don't like anything that they build.

It looks like a luxury hotel for cars. The people get the stingier volume of space upstairs. Hmm... Finally, someone who knows what's important to Americans.

If they add all those fins and white beams they had in the rendering after the fact it will be pretty obvious how much a party city building it is with fake design plastered on the standard blue glass box. Its none done yet but damn it seems like they really cut the budget during construction and just said screw it build a blue box and lets go home.

Looks life they turned it into a generic office building?

I remember when it was an hour glass looking hotel with white being it's primary color. It looks absolutely nothing like the original plans. What a major disappointment. I'd bet the inside is equally as bland.