Promenade

This project was selected as a Merit winner in ARCHITECT's 2024 Architecture & Interiors Awards, Architecture: Mixed Use category.

“I looked at the canopies in the front and the way they were kind of enlivening that façade. I thought there was a bravery in the whole team, from the owner to the architect, to try to elevate what could have been a pretty uneventful.” –Juror Ben Crawford

Promenade is a mixed-use office and retail center in Houston that seamlessly integrates indoor and outdoor spaces for each tenant. The exteriors, designed as green spaces with planted gardens and outdoor seating, connect people to their surroundings and extend the functionality of indoor activities to the outdoors. These green areas are angled towards the street, enhancing orientation and visibility for visitors.

To mitigate Houston’s hot climate, Promenade employs self-cooling facades, tall shading fins, and trellises, enhancing outdoor comfort while reducing solar heat gain and energy use. These architectural elements create micro-climate zones and establish a distinct identity for the center. Tall fins, some covered with mesh for climbing plants, surround each entrance, providing shade as they rise from the gardens.

The self-cooling concrete walls, designed with climate engineering firm Transsolar, are part of a building envelope optimized for outdoor comfort. These patterned concrete walls dissipate solar heat more efficiently than flat walls, especially when exposed to wind. Walls in direct sunlight feature more patterning to enhance self-cooling. Thermal imaging tests on heated panels with different patterns revealed a 15-degree surface temperature difference, demonstrating that a panel with 70% more surface area only increased mass by 6%, releasing heat more effectively and economically.

Promenade's gardens, inspired by various local ecologies, include a Texas rock garden, a tall grass garden, a pollinator garden, and a desert garden. These spaces connect the indoors to a multi-sensory outdoor environment, featuring the scent of jasmine climbers and the shade of bamboo groves. This blend of architecture and nature, using just 2% of the site, significantly enhances the daily experience for visitors and tenants.

Project: Promenade
Location: Houston
Client/Owner: Gip Real Estate Holdings

Design Architect: MODU
Phu Hoang (Founding Director), Rachely Rotem (Founding Director), Tom Sterling (Senior Designer), Brenda Lim (Junior Designer)
Architect of Record: Identity Architects
William Kalkman (Project Manager)
Construction Start Date: 03/2021
Construction End Date: 03/2023
Interior Designer: n/a
Mechanical Engineer: ASEI Engineering
Structural Engineer: CJG Engineers
Electrical Engineer: ASEI Engineering
Civil Engineer: ALJ Lindsey
Construction Manager: n/a
General Contractor: Axiom Construction
Landscape Architect: MODU (design), Kudela & Weihneimer (local)
Lighting Designer: n/a
Any other consultants, with their roles:
Climate Engineer: Transsolar
Size in Square Feet: 13,500
Cost: $1.8 mil

Photography: Naho Kubota, Leonid Furmansky

MATERIALS AND SOURCES:
Concrete: Site-cast
Exterior Wall Systems: Tilt-up wall concrete, stucco over densglass
Glass: Guardian
Lighting: MP Lighting, Klik USA, B-K Lighting, Kim Lighting, MULE Lighting
Metal: Berridge
Paints and Finishes: Sherwin Williams
Photovoltaics or other Renewables: n/a
Plumbing and Water System: n/a
Roofing: TPO Roofing
Site and Landscape Products: MMCite
Structural System: Tilt-up wall concrete, steel frame
Windows and Doors: Kawneer