Luxury is what residents at the Highland Tower Condominium in Houston expect for three-bedroom units that price for up to $1,295,000. Architects from Ziegler Cooper kept that in mind when they designed the 15-story building, targeting young professionals and empty-nesters, to feel like a five-star resort.
Amenities include a fifth-floor, landscaped roof terrace featuring an infinity-edge pool, covered poolside pavilion with an outdoor kitchen and fireplaces, putting green, and green space. Other amenities include an indoor fitness center overlooking the pool with a private massage therapy room, plus an entertainment/dining room with its own catering kitchen.
But the main draw is the condo’s Highland Village location, says Scott Ziegler, AIA, founding principal of Ziegler Cooper. “The overall consideration for developing the building was its setting and neighborhood,” he says. Its proximity within a five-minute walk to 15 to 20 restaurants and bars makes the community a model for how walkable Houston could become, Ziegler notes.
Eighty percent of the condos in the Tower are now purchased, largely in part because the financing for the project got under way right before the recession hit, meaning it was one of the only high-rises to get off the ground in the past few years. But that’s changing now, Ziegler notes, with other high-rise developments planned for this area of the city. “Texas, and Houston in particular, has led the job-growth market in the country for the last 10 years,” he says. “We have a stronger market than the rest of the country for high-rise development.”
