By Sandra Baker
Sundance Square will begin construction on two boutique-style office buildings next spring that will frame a long-planned central plaza on Main Street in the heart of downtown Fort Worth.
A third office building, at the southeast corner of Third and Throckmorton streets, will be built after the first two are completed. That building will also include a penthouse floor of loft apartments and the floor will be connected to the adjoining Sanger Lofts Building.
All three buildings will have space for shops and restaurants at ground level. Two buildings will have six floors and one will have five. In all, the buildings will add more than 221,000 square feet of office space and 41,500 square feet of retail space to the downtown market.
The buildings have been designed, but the look of the central plaza is still up in the air. Construction on the buildings will start after the Main Street Arts Festival in April.
Johnny Campbell, Sundance Square's president and CEO, said Sundance executives just completed interviewing several landscape architect firms.
"We're excited beyond belief," Campbell said about the project. "We've seen this as a centerpiece for a long time."
Sundance Square unveiled plans to the Downtown Design Review Board on Thursday, which gave Sundance the go-ahead. The project involves two city blocks owned by Sundance and a portion of a third block it owns but has not developed.
Ed Bass, project developer, said the buildings feature highly designed finishes and architectural details. "We will also continue with the approach of creating buildings in a traditional architectural style enhancing the character and ambiance of Sundance Square's rich history," Bass said.
The first building, 420 Commerce St., will be built on the east half of the block bordered by Main, Commerce, Third and Fourth. It will front Commerce and stretch from the north side of the Flying Saucer Building, also known as the Land Title Building, to Third.
The five-story building will be more than 83,000 square feet, including 17,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space. The upper four floors will access terraces on both ends of the building, and the structure will be set back slightly from Commerce so that it does not overwhelm the historic Land Title, Sundance said.
The building is divided into three parts to fit with other buildings in the area, Sundance said. The center facade features three-story-high arched brick window bays over a brick and granite base.
The second building, 425 Houston St., will sit on the west half of the block bordered by Third, Fourth, Main and Houston. The Jett Building, which is at Main and Third and has the Chisholm Trail mural, will be preserved.
The Houston building will be about 93,000 square feet on six floors, including 12,393 square feet of ground-level retail space. The facade will include a mix of granite, limestone, brick and decorative aluminum, inspired by other historic buildings including the Blackstone Hotel and the Western Union Building, Sundance said.
The central plaza will be between the buildings and bisected by Main Street. The open space will be nearly the equivalent of one city block. The buildings will have entrances on the park sides, and the Houston building will have a permanent stage to serve as a backdrop for events, Campbell said.
Sundance will lose 210 parking spaces on the surface lots, but that was anticipated when Sundance built the Chase Building, Fourth and Throckmorton. That building, which opened in 2002, required 350 parking spaces, but more than 760 were built in the adjoining garage.
The third building, 407 Throckmorton, will be at the southeast corner of Throckmorton and Third. A restaurant building at Third and Houston will be torn down. The top floor of the new six-story building will have six penthouse apartments with outdoor terraces.
The Throckmorton building will be the largest of the three, at more than 99,000 square feet, including 12,196 square feet of retail space. The building will be divided horizontally into three unique facades, taking a cue from Chicago architecture at the turn of the century, Sundance said.
Campbell said he has oral commitments from "several tenants" for the retail space for the Commerce building, but Sundance's leasing team will now begin aggressively seeking office tenants. He said leasing the space won't take long.
"It feels as though they will be in high demand," Campbell said of the buildings.
Construction could take about 18 months on the first two buildings. They will be completed as shells, with floors finished as tenants sign leases.
The Throckmorton building will be started upon completion of the other buildings, in part because Sundance doesn't want to tie up the intersection at Third and Houston, considered one of downtown's busiest spots.
The last new building added by Sundance was The Carnegie, which opened at Third and Taylor streets in 2008. It is now 80 percent leased.
"We are seeing and have been seeing an increase in leasing velocity for commercial office space," Campbell said. "It's enough to see encouragement."
In 2010, Sundance bought the last parcel, 15,000 square feet, at the southwest corner of Third and Commerce, to be able to move forward with the project.
David M. Schwarz Architects is the designer of the project. Schwarz has been the master-plan architect for Sundance Square since 1989.
The Projects Group in Fort Worth has been named the project manager, Bennett Benner Pettit in Fort Worth is the architect of record and the Beck Group has been retained as construction manager.
500 West 7th Street, Suite 1400