Explore Houston with These Guided Off-Site Tours!
Get ready for a real local welcome to Houston! Add a tour of your choice below to your registration.
If you have already registered and would like to add a tour, visit the conference registration page, click 'Modify Registration' and enter the reference number that was provided to you in your registration confirmation email. Don’t wait, limited spots are available!
Thank you to the Houston Chapter for helping to coordinate!
POSTHTX LEED: See Sustainability in Action
Join us to tour POSTHTX, Houston’s hub for culture, food and recreation. The POST is located at the site of the historic Barbara Jordan Post Office. In 2015, the building was decommissioned and sold. The new owners wanted to honor the buildings' history while creating something new for the future of Houston, and the idea for POST was born.
This large, mixed-use, adaptive reuse project will show off the creativity of the designers and the complexity of the project, all while becoming LEED BD+C Gold Certified. This is not an easy designation to attain for any project, but especially not a project of this scale. POST is home to Texas’s largest rooftop park and farm.
After completing the tour, participants will be able to:
- Learn about the challenges of adaptive reuse of a historic building.
- Understand design intricacies of mixed-use adaptive use projects.
- Identify the challenges and opportunities of becoming LEED BD+C Gold Certified and what this means for planning and specifying these types of projects.
- Discuss the development of the rooftop park and farm and the benefit to the community this provides.
Attendees can expect a 20 to 30-minute walk to the site. During the tour, there will be walking and standing with occasional stools/benches for resting. A waiver will be provided to you onsite and will need to be completed to attend this tour.
Price: $75.00
Date: Friday, October 18
Time: 2:30 Meet in the hotel lobby. Tour is from 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
LU Credits: 2 CSI LUs, Approved for 2 AIA/HSW LUs
Location: 4401 Franklin St., Houston, TX 77201
The ION: Innovation in Design with Community in Mind
The Ion is the centerpiece of a new innovation district development led by Rice University. Covering 15 acres in Midtown Houston, the district is designed to incubate and house startups, corporations, venture capitalists, business accelerator programs, and academics.
The Ion, a certified LEED BD+C Gold Certified building, transformed the well-known Art-Deco Sears department store on Main Street, an iconic and historic 81-year-old landmark, into a 300,000 square-foot tech-focused collaboration center that includes shared workspace, prototyping and maker resources, event space, classrooms, restaurants, and indoor/outdoor communal areas with shared amenities.
Come walk through the space to see and learn firsthand how this renovation's design and technical decisions enable the Ion to offer a space where tenants and visitors alike find ways to engage in the innovation ecosystem envisioned here.
After completing the tour, participants will be able to:
- Understand the technical requirements and design implications for a tech-focused collaboration hub.
- Identify the challenges and opportunities to attaining LEED BD+C Golf Certified.
- Learn firsthand how this renovation's design and technical decisions enable the Ion to offer a space where tenants and visitors alike find ways to engage in the innovation ecosystem envisioned when the project started.
- Understand design specifics unique to a large-scale project in midtown Houston.
Attendees will walk and take the Houston Metro Rail, complete with local Houston CSI chapter hosts to accompany the group to guide and share about their city.There will be walking and standing during the tour with occasional stools/benches for resting. A waiver will be provided to you onsite and will need to be completed to attend this tour.
Price: $75.00
Date: Friday, October 18
Time: 2:30 Meet in the hotel lobby. Tour is from 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
LU Credits: 2 CSI LUs, Approved for 2 AIA/HSW LUs
Location: 4201 Main Street, Houston, TX 77002