THE WOODLANDS – The Woodlands Development Co. starts construction this week on two new Exxon Mobil office buildings after The Woodlands beat out the Springwoods Village project to secure the energy company expansion.
These two new buildings come on top of an enormous campus Exxon Mobil has underway north of Houston. Exxon Mobil is already constructing a 385-acre campus and construction has progressed significantly on 20 office buildings in the campus, which is located in Springwoods Village.
The Woodlands Development Co. announced Monday that Exxon Mobil is expanding again in a separate project north of Houston. This time it’s for two 12-story buildings, each measuring about 300,000 square feet. The two buildings are being constructed in the Hughes Landing section of The Woodlands.
“We are very pleased to welcome ExxonMobil as a tenant in Hughes Landing, only a short distance from their new campus,” said Paul Layne, Executive Vice President of Master Planned Communities for The Howard Hughes Corp. “Their offices in Hughes Landing are ideally situated, only steps away from all that Hughes Landing has to offer, providing their employees a one-of-a-kind setting where they can work in a vibrant lakeside community.”
Exxon Mobil leased 478,000 SF, consisting of an entire office building and a portion of a second office building at Hughes Landing. Ronnie Deyo of Jones Lang LaSalle assisted in the lease negotiations.
Layne said a number of developers had sought the Exxon Mobil facility, but The Woodlands’ Hughes Landing and Springwoods Village were the finalists. The project, which will house 1,430 Exxon Mobil employees, is also supported with a tax abatement from Montgomery County.
The two new buildings, expected to be completed in the first half of 2016, will be designed by Kirksey Architects of Houston. The general contractor is Harvey Builders. A 13-story, 800,000-square-foot parking garage adjacent to the two Exxon Mobil buildings, which front the east side of Lake Woodlands between Grogan’s Mill Road and Lake Woodlands Drive.
Hughes Landing on Lake Woodlands is planned to include up to 11 Class A office buildings, shopping, dining and entertainment, a Whole Foods Market, an upscale hotel, state-of-the-art fitness center and up to 800 multi-family residences. The first office building, One Hughes Landing, was completed and almost fully leased in only 10 months. Given the strong demand, construction and leasing is already underway for Two Hughes Landing, with a spring opening planned.
Leasing is also well underway for Restaurant Row in Hughes Landing, where a wide selection of culinary establishments is planned. Escalante’s Fine Tex-Mex & Tequila and Whiskey Cake Kitchen & Bar have signed leases and will soon begin construction.
The Woodlands is a 28,000-acre master-planned community located 27 miles north of downtown Houston. The Woodlands Development Co. is a subsidiary of Dallas-based Howard Hughes Corp.