Location, location

For most of the original run, interior scenes were shot in Los Angeles. The new show, however, is a feast of North Texas locations, thanks largely to a joint venture between the city of Dallas and South Side Studios in the Cedars neighborhood south of I-30.

“There was a high probability that Dallas was not going to be shot in Dallas,” says South Side Studios founder Jack Matthews. “TNT gave us a list of what they needed. We agreed to no rent, and the city paid to finish out the studio.” Two Matthews properties, South Side on Lamar and the Beat Lofts, are filming locations.

Sue Ellen Ewing, now richer than her ex-husband, J.R., runs her empire from a contemporary office in Uptown’s Saint Ann Court. Bobby Ewing’s attorney overlooks the new Klyde Warren deck park. In reality, it’s the office of top-flight divorce attorney Ike Vanden Eykel.

“When they asked if they could use my office, I took a deep breath and said, ‘Of course,’” says Vanden Eykel. “Then, I was avalanched with 50 some-odd people who took over my space. But they put it all back, and there wasn’t a speck of dust on the place.”

If the show gets picked up for a second season, most cast members are pulling for shooting to resume in Texas. “Dallas is a home away from home for me,” Metcalfe says. “I have lots of friends here, and it lends a real authenticity to have it shot in Texas.”

On Wednesday, the day the pilot airs, the City Council will vote on a proposal by the Office of Economic Development that the production company, Warner Horizon, be offered a $200,000-per-season incentive package for the next six seasons to keep filming here.

Always fond of declarative statements, Duffy says, “Here we are and here we will stay.”

On a hilltop overlooking the Katy Trail, Gabriel Barbier-Mueller is pondering his next move.
The 17 blocks of his Harwood development district look like a giant chessboard stretching from the entrance of the Dallas North Tollway toward the downtown skyline. Completed office and residential towers are towering above some still-vacant blocks.
 
“We have land to build another 7 million square feet,” said Barbier-Mueller, who moved to Dallas from Switzerland in the late 1970s to learn the real estate business.
 
Since then he’s built seven Uptown buildings.
 
And done commercial property deals in London, Paris, California and elsewhere.
 
Barbier-Mueller’s next Dallas project at Wolf and McKinnon streets will be a 31-story apartment high-rise and a 27-story office tower linked by an urban shopping village.
 
There will also be a boutique grocer and between nine and a dozen small restaurants.
 
“Coming out of the recession, I never thought that we’d be planning new buildings so soon,” Barbier-Mueller said. “We are very busy and doing a lot of new things.
 
“Someone said it takes 30 years to be an instant success.”
 
It was three decades ago that Barbier-Mueller kicked off his Harwood development with the purchase of land for the Rolex Building near the corner of Cedar Springs Road and Pearl Street.
 
“This property was a mix of vacant lots and run-down houses,” he said. “When I bought the first block we didn’t know the Crescent was coming.”
But the site’s skyline views and location near the entrance to the Dallas North Tollway convinced him it could be a prime tract.
 
Boom begins
When the chairman of watchmaker Rolex was in town soon after looking for a new service center location, Barbier-Mueller dragged him to see the property sitting across the street from car sales lots and Mexican restaurants.
 
“He was considering a site up on the tollway,” Barbier-Mueller said. “But he understood the potential for this property when he saw the sea of cars passing in front of it.”
Still, after the six-story Rolex Building was announced, skeptics said the deal would flop.
“I still hear that from time to time,” Barbier-Mueller said.
 
More than 4,000 people work in the Harwood district. And the area around the development has boomed.
 
“There are 170,000 people living in a 3-mile radius of the Rolex Building,” Barbier-Mueller said.
 
Developer Harwood International’s newest building — the 26-story Saint Ann Court office tower — is 95 percent leased.
“We just had two people literally fighting over the same empty space,” said Jihane Boury, Harwood vice president of leasing. “We have over a half-million square feet of office lease proposals right now” for the entire project.
 
That’s why the developer is quickly retooling its office-building plans. Harwood’s Phase VII office tower proposed for Wolf Street could be up to 900,000 square feet.
 
And Harwood International has other office building plans on the drawing board.
 
“We basically can accommodate any size tenant,” Barbier-Mueller said. “We have the perfect building sites between the Crescent and the American Airlines Center arena.
 
“There is a lot of demand for office space.”
 
Coming attractions
Harwood is remodeling its 13-year-old Jones Day Building on Harwood Street. And a makeover of the garden it overlooks is also under way.
Downtown law firm Winstead PC will move into the former Centex Building next door sometime in August.
 
The firm’s planned Bleu Ciel apartment tower will be built at the north end of the Harwood district on the Katy Trail. It is the developer’s second residential project.
 
The 31-story Azure condominium high-rise opened in 2007. Its debut — a year before the recession — could have been better timed.
“Instead of taking three years, it wound up taking six years” to sell, Barbier-Mueller said. “We have about 20 left.” Five of those condo units are under contract.
 
His son Alexis is managing director of Harwood International’s investor relations and development business. He previously spent four years working with Fortis Bank but grew up watching the Harwood district being built.
 
“I spent some time working in Paris and the U.K.” before coming back to Dallas, he said.
 
Barbier-Mueller intends for both of his sons to continue with the ongoing development of the family project.
 
But with the fast pace of construction, it won’t take another 30 years to complete.
 
“Look at just what’s happened in the last few years,” he said.
 
http://www.dallasnews.com/business/commercial-real-estate/headlines/20120322-harwood-international-plans-new-apartments-retail-and-offices.ece
 

TexasBusiness.com
Friday, March 2, 2012

Texas Business reports: DALLAS—Real estate developer Harwood International reached a lease agreement with Emirates in the Rolex Building.

Emirates expanded its offices to the district of Harwood due to its recent launch of non-stop daily service between DFW and Dubai (DXB) International Airport.

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Dallas Morning News, Steve Brown
Wednesday, February 29, 2012

International airline Emirates just started its long haul service from Dallas-Fort Worth to the Middle East.

And now the global carrier is renting a sales office here.

The Dubai-based airline has leased 3,000-square-feet from Harwood International in Uptown’s Rolex building.

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