Designed by OMA Partner Jason Long and OMA New York, POST Houston is the transformation of a former United States Post Office mail sorting warehouse into a mixed-use, public space in downtown Houston. The owners of the 500,000-square-foot concrete warehouse, which was originally built in 1962, wanted to preserve the scale and aura of the structure, while also integrating it into the fabric of the downtown area. 

“Our approach balanced wholesale preservation with surgical interventions,” said the architects. “Like farmers working on concrete soil, we raked a series of horizontal thoroughfares into and through it. Along each line, we cut an interior void,” they continued. The apertures allow for light to penetrate the deep floor plates and intersect the building’s three levels: a commercial ground plane, a second level of expansive office spaces, and a six-acre rooftop park.” 

They also establish three zones for different programs: cultural and retail, food market, and collaborative workspace. Within these zones are three atriums, labeled X,O, and Z, which each feature a monumental staircase that leads visitors to the rooftop. 

As per the architects: “The stairs are distinct in character, structure, and material, but all are designed to encourage interaction. Their paths are doubled, intertwined, and expanded to provide not just trajectories up to the roof but places for accidental encounter—each is an instrument to bring people together.”

Image: OMA / Leonid Furmansky

A large food hall called POST Market is housed in the O-atrium. A system of stainless steel elements, including seating, counters, kitchens, and a floating mesh halo, compose a dense matrix of food kiosks. At the center of the grid of kiosks, two intertwining stairs connect the market hall to the rooftop. Called the Skylawn, the rooftop space features uninterrupted views of the downtown skyline. This expansive 170,000-square-foot space also provides room for two additional restaurants, a large urban farm, performance zones, shaded gardens, and recreation areas. 

“This week’s initial events were an exciting first step. POST Houston will be a microcosm of the diversity that makes the city itself so exciting: an agglomeration of culture, food, and tropical urbanism housed within a solid concrete shell,” said Jason Long. “The impact should be larger than even the massive footprint of the warehouse itself. By cutting into the building and drawing people in and through it, we are aiming to fold different programs into every corner—weddings next to food halls next to concerts next to new ways of working—and to turn Houston to a view that reveals the city’s radical ambition.”