Architecture Walks

Filtering by: Architecture Walks
First Montrose Commons Architecture Walk
Apr
14
2:00 PM14:00

First Montrose Commons Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

What is now the First Montrose Commons Historic District includes two historic neighborhoods platted on what was then Houston’s southwestern edge: the Lockhart, Connor & Barziza Addition (1873) and the Bute Addition (1907). Construction in the area began in earnest after the adjacent Montrose Place neighborhood opened in 1911. Today, the streets of First Montrose Commons are lined with an eclectic mix of large and small homes and apartment buildings designed in a variety of 20th-century styles.

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The Women of Glenwood walking tour
Sep
28
10:00 AM10:00

The Women of Glenwood walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Historic Glenwood Cemetery is known for its beauty, but the stories of the people buried there are just as compelling — especially Glenwood's women, whose legacies range from the suffrage movement to the silver screen. This tour tells the stories of some of those fascinating women and their impacts locally and nationally. Among the featured subjects are Charlotte Allen, the wife of Houston co-founder Augustus Allen; suffragists Annette Finnigan and Florence Sterling; publisher and stateswoman Oveta Culp Hobby, who led the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps during World War II; and movie star Gene Tierney.

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Historic Glenwood Cemetery Part I: Houston Before Oil walking tour
Nov
23
10:00 AM10:00

Historic Glenwood Cemetery Part I: Houston Before Oil walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Glenwood Cemetery, established in 1871 on rolling, wooded land near Buffalo Bayou, is one of the most beautiful outdoor spaces in Houston. It is also the resting place of scores of people who built Houston into the city we know today — railroad executives, bankers, politicians and architects, among many others.

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Rice University Architecture Walk
Mar
10
2:00 PM14:00

Rice University Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

The Rice University campus is one of the most beautiful places in Houston thanks to the Mediterranean-influenced designs of Boston architects Cram, Goodhue & Ferguson, who were responsible for the university's earliest buildings. Our 90-minute, docent-guided walking tour circles the campus, exploring the history of the university itself, the story and murder of its founder and the development of Rice's signature architectural style.

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20th Century Glenwood walking tour
Feb
24
10:00 AM10:00

20th Century Glenwood walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Although Glenwood Cemetery is known for its splendid Victorian monuments, there’s a more modern side as well. This docent-guided walking tour explores some of the newer sections of Glenwood and the lives of some of the well-known 20th century Houstonians buried there, including businessmen George and Herman Brown; cotton magnate and statesman Will Clayton; Edgar Odell Lovett, Rice University’s first president; Astrodome builder Judge Roy Hofheinz; and longtime television anchor Ron Stone.

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Downtown's Historic Waterfront Architecture Walk
Feb
11
2:00 PM14:00

Downtown's Historic Waterfront Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Buffalo Bayou in downtown Houston was teeming with activity at the turn of the 20th century, from the wharves of the Port of Houston at Allen's Landing to the produce wholesalers, warehouses, breweries and factories that lined the bayou’s banks. The scene is very different today, but remnants of the busy commercial district of a century ago are visible if you know where to look for them.

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Allen's Landing Architecture Walk
Jan
14
2:00 PM14:00

Allen's Landing Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Our 90-minute, docent-guided walking tour of the neighborhood tells the story of Allen's Landing and looks at historic buildings nearby, including turn-of-the-century warehouses, a former neighborhood saloon with a checkered past and the restored Willow Street Pump Station, the centerpiece of Houston's first sewer system. We'll also get a unique perspective on Allen's Landing as we walk across the historic Main Street Viaduct, one of the city's major public works projects of the 1910s.

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Glenwood Art & Architecture walking tour
Nov
25
10:00 AM10:00

Glenwood Art & Architecture walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

This two-hour walking tour traces the changing tastes and the varied social and personal motivations reflected in some of Glenwood's outstanding monuments, which range from elaborate Victorian obelisks and angels to crisp, modern compositions. Along the way, docents will explain the symbolism and stories behind the monuments and will discuss the lives of Houstonians both famous and forgotten who commissioned them.

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Lovett Boulevard and Audubon Place Architecture Walk
Nov
12
2:00 PM14:00

Lovett Boulevard and Audubon Place Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Montrose Place set a new standard for Houston’s suburban development when it opened in 1911. The neighborhood was the city’s first large-scale planned subdivision, with more than 1,000 lots and $1 million in improvements; its four principal boulevards quickly became some of the most fashionable addresses in town. This walking tour explores two of those boulevards — Lovett Boulevard and Audubon Place — and what they can tell us about early 20th-century suburban design in the Bayou City.

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Downtown's Evolving Skyline Architecture Walk
Oct
15
2:00 PM14:00

Downtown's Evolving Skyline Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

This tour explores the changes in downtown Houston's skyline during the past 100 years through buildings like 806 Main, called "Carter's Folly" when it was completed in 1910 because some locals thought a 16-story building couldn't stand on its own, and Philip Johnson's groundbreaking Pennzoil Place, which set the stage for the postmodern skyline of the 1980s.

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Historic Glenwood Cemetery, Part II: Houston After Oil walking tour
Sep
23
10:00 AM10:00

Historic Glenwood Cemetery, Part II: Houston After Oil walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

This two-hour, docent-guided tour looks at the lives and legacies of some of the men and women buried at Glenwood Cemetery who shaped Houston after the turn of the 20th century. They include oilmen R.L. Blaffer and Ross Sterling, who were among the founders of Humble Oil (later ExxonMobil), and Howard Hughes, the legendary billionaire whose family fortune was built on oilfield services.

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Broadacres Architecture Walk
Sep
10
6:00 PM18:00

Broadacres Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Broadacres was among the residential neighborhoods developed near Rice University in the early 20th century. Our docent-guided walking tour explores the history of this beautiful historic district, the architecture of its gracious homes and the stories of the oil, cotton, lumber, banking and railroad families that built them.

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Cherokee Place Architecture Walk
Aug
13
6:00 PM18:00

Cherokee Place Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Oilman Henry Masterson developed Cherokee Place in the early 1920s as open prairie southwest of Houston gave way to desirable neighborhoods bordering the recently opened Rice University campus. In the years that followed, businessmen, doctors and attorneys built comfortable homes on Cherokee’s large lots. Many of those homes still stand, reflecting the range of residential styles popular among Houston’s middle class from the 1920s to the 1940s.

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Architecture of the Museum of Fine Arts Architecture Walk
Jun
18
6:00 PM18:00

Architecture of the Museum of Fine Arts Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

The campus of Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts includes work by locally and internationally acclaimed architects, from William Ward Watkin’s original classically inspired 1920s building through mid-century additions designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and striking 21st-century structures by Steven Holl Architects. Together, these buildings — along with landscape elements such as Isamu Noguchi’s Cullen Sculpture Garden — show how museum design and conceptions of cultural space have evolved over the past century.

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Historic Glenwood Cemetery Part I: Houston Before Oil walking tour
May
27
10:00 AM10:00

Historic Glenwood Cemetery Part I: Houston Before Oil walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Glenwood Cemetery, established in 1871 on rolling, wooded land near Buffalo Bayou, is one of the most beautiful outdoor spaces in Houston. It is also the resting place of scores of people who built Houston into the city we know today — railroad executives, bankers, politicians and architects, among many others.

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Market Square Architecture Walk
May
7
2:00 PM14:00

Market Square Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Market Square, one of the public squares laid out in the Allen brothers' original plan of Houston, was home to the city market and City Hall from 1841 to 1939. During that time, the square became the center of Houston's early commercial district. Although the area declined in the mid-20th century, preservation projects have brought new uses to its historic buildings and new life to Market Square itself. Our docent-guided tour explores the neighborhood’s past, present and future as a vital part of downtown Houston.

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Avondale Architecture Walk
Apr
16
2:00 PM14:00

Avondale Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Avondale, a residential neighborhood in what is now the Montrose area, was part of the first wave of Houston’s southwestern suburban expansion in the early years of the 20th century. Our 90-minute docent-guided walking tour explores the neighborhood’s history and explains how Avondale has changed over the years and the work that has been done to restore many of its outstanding historic homes.

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Beth Israel Cemetery Architecture Walk
Mar
12
2:00 PM14:00

Beth Israel Cemetery Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

When Beth Israel Cemetery was established in 1844, Houston was still a frontier village — in fact, the cemetery was located well out of town on the San Felipe Road (now West Dallas Avenue). Over the years Houston has grown up around Beth Israel and many of its most prominent Jewish leaders have been laid to rest here, including merchant families the Levys, Meyers and Sakowitzes; philanthropist Ben Taub; and Rabbi Hyman Judah Schachtel, who led Congregation Beth Israel for 32 years.

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The Women of Glenwood walking tour
Feb
25
10:00 AM10:00

The Women of Glenwood walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Historic Glenwood Cemetery is known for its beauty, but the stories of the people buried there are just as compelling — especially Glenwood's women, whose legacies range from the suffrage movement to the silver screen. This tour tells the stories of some of those fascinating women and their impacts locally and nationally. Among the featured subjects are Charlotte Allen, the wife of Houston co-founder Augustus Allen; suffragists Annette Finnigan and Florence Sterling; publisher and stateswoman Oveta Culp Hobby, who led the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps during World War II; and movie star Gene Tierney.

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Old Sixth Ward Architecture Walk
Feb
12
2:00 PM14:00

Old Sixth Ward Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

The Old Sixth Ward, one of Houston's most beloved historic neighborhoods, was settled in the mid-19th century on what was then the edge of the city. The principal developer was W.R. Baker, Houston mayor and president of the Houston & Texas Central Railway, and many of the neighborhood’s early residents were railroad workers who decorated their cottages with hand-cut gingerbread ornamentation.

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First Montrose Commons Architecture Walk
Jan
15
2:00 PM14:00

First Montrose Commons Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

What is now the First Montrose Commons Historic District includes two historic neighborhoods platted on what was then Houston’s southwestern edge: the Lockhart, Connor & Barziza Addition (1873) and the Bute Addition (1907). Construction in the area began in earnest after the adjacent Montrose Place neighborhood opened in 1911. Today, the streets of First Montrose Commons are lined with an eclectic mix of large and small homes and apartment buildings designed in a variety of 20th-century styles.

View Event →
20th Century Glenwood walking tour
Nov
26
10:00 AM10:00

20th Century Glenwood walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Although Glenwood Cemetery is known for its splendid Victorian monuments, but there’s a more modern side to the cemetery as well. This docent-guided walking tour explores some of the newer sections of Glenwood and the lives of some of the well-known 20th century Houstonians buried there, including businessmen George and Herman Brown; cotton magnate and statesman Will Clayton; Edgar Odell Lovett, Rice University’s first president; Astrodome builder Judge Roy Hofheinz; and longtime television anchor Ron Stone.en George and Herman Brown; cotton magnate and statesman Will Clayton; Edgar Odell Lovett, Rice University’s first president; Astrodome builder Judge Roy Hofheinz; and longtime television anchor Ron Stone.

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Downtown East Architecture Walk
Nov
13
2:00 PM14:00

Downtown East Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

This 90-minute docent-guided tour traces the history of downtown Houston east of Main Street through architecture old and new, ranging from historic structures such as Union Station and the 1915 Texas Company Building to new developments like Discovery Green, which has been a catalyst for nearly $2 billion in new construction.

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Founders Memorial Cemetery Architecture Walk
Oct
9
2:00 PM14:00

Founders Memorial Cemetery Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Located in the shadow of the downtown skyscrapers, Founders Memorial Cemetery is one of the few physical links to the early days of Houston and Texas. Our 90-minute docent-guided walking tour explores the resting place of veterans of the Texas Revolution, heroes of the Battle of San Jacinto and government officials of the Republic of Texas.

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Courthouse District Architecture Walk
Sep
11
6:00 PM18:00

Courthouse District Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

As large as it is, Houston shares a feature with dozens of small towns across Texas: a courthouse square. On Sunday evening, September 11, we'll take a look at the history and architecture of the neighborhood surrounding the Harris County Courthouse — one of Houston's most historic areas.

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Glenwood Art & Architecture walking tour
Aug
27
10:00 AM10:00

Glenwood Art & Architecture walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

This two-hour walking tour traces the changing tastes and the varied social and personal motivations reflected in some of Glenwood's outstanding monuments, which range from elaborate Victorian obelisks and angels to crisp, modern compositions. Along the way, docents will explain the symbolism and stories behind the monuments and will discuss the lives of Houstonians both famous and forgotten who commissioned them.

View Event →
Woodland Heights Architecture Walk
Aug
14
6:00 PM18:00

Woodland Heights Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

The William A. Wilson Realty Co. began developing Woodland Heights in 1907 on 136 acres of land that was once part of John Austin's Mexican land grant. The neighborhood was one of Houston's first "streetcar suburbs" — a streetcar line ran from downtown along Houston Avenue to just outside the Woodland Heights gates, enabling middle-class Houstonians to live in a lovely wooded setting and easily commute to their jobs.

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Broadacres Architecture Walk
Jul
10
6:00 PM18:00

Broadacres Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Broadacres was among the residential neighborhoods developed near Rice University in the early 20th century. Its breathtaking oak allées and landscaping were the work of William Ward Watkin, the supervising architect of the Rice campus, and many of Houston's finest architects — including Watkin, John Staub and Birdsall Briscoe — designed the houses that line North and South boulevards.

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Turner Addition Architecture Walk
Jun
12
6:00 PM18:00

Turner Addition Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

Turner Addition contains a fascinating variety of 20th century residential architecture ranging from picturesque 1920s suburban homes to modern and postmodern townhouses from the 1970s and '80s. Our 90-minute, docent-guided walking tour traces the development of the neighborhood and includes work by prominent architects including William Ward Watkin, Alfred C. Finn, Howard Barnstone and Carlos Schoeppl.

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The Women of Glenwood walking tour
May
28
10:00 AM10:00

The Women of Glenwood walking tour

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this tour.

Historic Glenwood Cemetery is known for its beauty, but the stories of the people buried there are just as compelling — especially Glenwood's women, whose legacies range from the suffrage movement to the silver screen. This tour tells the stories of some of those fascinating women and their impacts locally and nationally. Among the featured subjects are Charlotte Allen, the wife of Houston co-founder Augustus Allen; suffragists Annette Finnigan and Florence Sterling; publisher and stateswoman Oveta Culp Hobby, who led the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps during World War II; and movie star Gene Tierney.

View Event →
Rice University Architecture Walk
May
15
2:00 PM14:00

Rice University Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

The Rice University campus is one of the most beautiful places in Houston thanks to the Mediterranean-influenced designs of Boston architects Cram, Goodhue & Ferguson, who were responsible for the university's earliest buildings. Our 90-minute, docent-guided walking tour circles the campus, exploring the history of the university itself, the story and murder of its founder and the development of Rice's signature architectural style.

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Civic Center and Theater District Architecture Walk
Apr
10
2:00 PM14:00

Civic Center and Theater District Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

When landscape architects Hare & Hare drew up plans for Houston's civic center in the late 1920s, they envisioned a group of stylistically similar Spanish-influenced buildings arranged around a public square. However, those plans were derailed by the Depression, and the city's governmental and cultural center ended up developing over the next 50 years in a variety of styles with few overall planning efforts. Today, structures in the Civic Center and the adjacent Theater District reflect not only the evolution of Houston's municipal and cultural institutions, but also changing architectural tastes.

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University of St. Thomas and Menil Architecture Walk
Mar
13
2:00 PM14:00

University of St. Thomas and Menil Architecture Walk

Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour.

This docent-guided walking tour focuses on the development of the University of St Thomas campus, based on its 1950s master plan by Philip Johnson, as well as the buildings of the adjacent Menil campus. Highlights include Eugene Aubry's recently restored Rothko Chapel and Renzo Piano's Menil Collection and Twombly Gallery as well as Johnson's Chapel of St. Basil at UST, one of the most distinctive worship spaces in Houston.

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