A long list of reputable architecture firms are contributing to a forthcoming, mixed-use development in the city of Houston. The RO is a major project backed by Transwestern Development Company, a local office. It’s being built adjacent to Houston’s River Oaks neighborhood, a historic locale built in the 1920s by William and Michael Hogg known for its gardens and verbose architecture.
The RO is slated for a 17-acre site at the intersection of West Alabama Street and Buffalo Speedway that once housed a research campus for Exxon-Mobil. The master plan, developers said, will essentially extend the qualities that make River Oaks special further into the city, namely its leafy public realm and walkable corridors. The tallest building at The RO will be 28 stories, delivering much needed density to the sprawling metropolis.
Pickard Chilton, a Connecticut office, is the doing the master plan. That firm is also designing office space and multifamily housing for the site.
Mass timber construction is on the rise. Once a specialty product found mostly in the multifamily sector, mass timber is now expanding its profile in the commercial sector.
Efficiency also characterizes fabrication of the building’s components. “The connections are pre-engineered, pre-drilled and pre-designed so that when the material actually shows up on the site, there’s very little construction waste at all because all the pieces are coming together,” said Anthony Markese, a principal at Pickard Chilton, which has designed more than 4 million square feet of mass timber projects.
Among them is T3 RiNo, a six-story, 220,000-square-foot mass timber building located in Denver’s River North Art District. In 2025, Xcel Energy will relocate its regional headquarters to the property, which is being developed by a joint venture of Ivanhoé Cambridge, Hines and McCaffery.
