Case Study

Lone Star Gas Lofts

Adaptive Reuse — Art Deco Heritage

Four 1924 Art Deco buildings on a full city block converted to 230 lofts with retail and structured parking.

Project Type: Adaptive Reuse / Multifamily
Location: Dallas, TX
Original Structure: Lone Star Gas Company Buildings (1924, Lang & Witchell)
Total Value: $46M
Units: 230 Lofts
Retail: 13,000 SF
Parking: 277 Structured Stalls
Completed: 2014
Developer: Hamilton Properties
Architect: Merriman Associates

A Full City Block of Art Deco

The Lone Star Gas Company complex occupies an entire city block in downtown Dallas — four interconnected buildings designed by Lang and Witchell in 1924. ANDRES converted the full complex into 230 loft apartments, 13,000 SF of ground-floor retail, and 277 structured parking stalls. The scale of the project — four distinct historic structures, each with its own structural system and facade character — made this one of the largest adaptive reuse efforts in Dallas at the time.

Preservation at Scale

Converting four historic buildings simultaneously required ANDRES to run what amounted to four parallel preservation projects under a single management structure. Each building had different floor-to-floor heights, different structural conditions, and different degrees of Art Deco ornamentation to preserve. The 277-stall parking structure was threaded into the complex where it could serve residents without dominating the historic street frontages that define the block's character.

Complexity highlights

Four Structures, One Project

Each of the four Lone Star Gas buildings has a distinct structural system, facade treatment, and internal layout. Unifying them into a single residential complex with shared corridors, mechanical systems, and life-safety infrastructure required resolving structural mismatches at every building junction — while preserving the individual architectural identity of each structure.

Structured Parking Integration

Inserting 277 parking stalls into a historic block without visible parking structures required locating the deck behind preserved facades and below grade where possible. The parking structure's foundations and columns had to avoid conflict with the existing historic foundations, some of which were nearly a century old and not documented to modern standards.

ANDRES's team had already completed the Dallas Power and Light conversion for the same developer — Hamilton Properties — giving them direct experience with Lang and Witchell Art Deco structures and an established working relationship with the ownership group.