70-acre mixed-use destination to rise in site of former ConcoPhillips campus in Houston’s Energy Corridor

Called Watermark District at Woodcreek, the project would convert a little under half of the 1.3 million square-foot campus into restaurants, cafes, a boutique hotel and apartments alongside a 100,000 square-foot fitness facility and 650,000 square-feet of office space.

The longtime former home of oil company ConocoPhillips would be transformed into a multi-tenant office campus connected with tree-lined outdoor walkways with waterfront views.

“This was a corporate headquarters for a large fossil fuel company, and I want to take this property back to a sustainable model showing how you can develop and redevelop for the next generation,” said Brad Freels, Midway CEO, in an interview. “When you tear down buildings, you’re tearing them down and throwing them in a landfill. The greenest building is the one you don’t tear down. What we’re going to try to do is take these structures that are very structurally sound and repurpose them into hotels and multifamily and the finest office.”

Midway is also partnering with a North Carolina-based technology firm 374Water to develop an onsite wastewater management system to convert wastewater and food waste into clean water and resources that can be reused on campus, although further details weren’t immediately available. The project would also preserve about 500 existing trees on site, along with 20 acres of green space and nine acres of lakes.

The campus rose during the oil boom of the 1980s when ConcoPhillips commissioned renowned architect Kevin Roche to develop its corporate headquarters in Houston’s west suburbs. Roche designed the campus to resemble a Japan fishing village, according to Midway, with a series of 16 buildings floating over a manmade lagoon. Although the roughly 40-year-old buildings would be modernized, Freels said Midway intends to maintain much of the original architectural style.

The huge fitness center on site already has a basketball court, an Olympic-size swimming saltwater swimming pool and soccer field. There’s also a jogging and walking trail plus access to the popular nearby Terry Hershey Park.

The two structures earmarked for a hotel and apartments would likely see the biggest changes with a new skin on the exterior, Freels said. Midway is testing whether one of the three-story buildings could structurally withstand additional levels for expanded multifamily space, so the developer doesn’t yet know how many apartment units may be on the campus.

The boutique hotel likely would have anywhere from 140 to 160 rooms under third-party management, Freels added.

While Midway is still in the early stages of planning, initially the real estate firm expects to have about six to seven food and beverage business within the Watermark campus. Although there could be service-oriented retail on site to appeal to office workers, Freels doesn’t expect to replicate the retail shopping seen at Midway’s CityCentre campus located just about 3.5 miles away.

“We won’t do a lot of Lululemon’s or Anthropologie’s here, but there is a huge opportunity for restaurants out here because it has a great daytime population,” he said. And in the evening, dinner crowds could funnel in from the nearby freeway, he added.

Midway’s interest in the site dates back to around 2017 when ConcoPhillips first announced it would relocate from the campus to a separate facility south of Interstate 10, and Midway first envisioned it as a possible redevelopment opportunity, Freels said. Instead ConcoPhillips sold the property to oil company Occidental Petroleum, which had planned to use the 17-building campus for its own headquarters.

But Occidental’s plans were scrapped when it merged with Anadarko Petroleum in 2019 then sold the facility to real estate firm Howard Hughes. In late 2021, an entity tied to Midway bought the campus for $25 million from Howard Hughes in late 2021, according to Howard Hughes S.E.C filings and Harris County deed records. Cushman Wakefield brokers Meredith Cullen and David Cook represented in Midway in the transaction.

Now Midway is focusing on how to bring its vision to life for Watermark with the help of OJB Landscape Architecture, engineering firm Jacobs and architecture firm PDR.

“It’s fabulous real estate and very well-conceived project. We’re excited,” Freels said.