Goodbye to 711 University, So Long to the BB&T...

Since I didn't get a picture of the bank before it became a big hole in the ground, we'll have to do with this, a picture from Google.

Today this is yet another student housing residential tower, known as Aspire College Station with 16 stories (including parking levels) and 800 beds but when I originally added this article in 2016 (here's the old page before I reworked it) it was the recently-demolished BB&T bank (hence the pun title). The chronology of the main bank building goes as such:

1962: College Station State Bank relocates to this building from a previous location.
1963: The name is changed to University National Bank.
1990: After a long run as University National Bank, it is acquired by Don Adam to become First American Bank (officially acquired that year)
2005: Citigroup acquires the bank chain, rebranded to Citibank
2014: BB&T purchases 41 Citibank branches including this one and rebrands them.
2016: BB&T relocates to The Rise at Northgate; building torn down, thus beginning and ending its life with relocation.

There was a second adjacent space (707 University Drive) which was a two-story office building with a small footprint. My records show this was used for non-bank space as early as 1974 (with the Provident Mutual Life Insurance Co.) and my 1989 phone book mentions "The Personal Computer Store" (with the ad mentioning it was "since 1984"). This became MicroAge by 1993, and starting in 1999 moved out to their current home (now known as Avinext) on East University Drive. I don't think anything has occupied the space since.

Because of the relative underuse of the space, 711 University was also where food trucks congregated (or near the now-defunct Notes-N-Quotes next door). Since I graduated back in 2014, I can't list all the more recent food trucks and trailers there, though here are a few I remember:

Wafology - Seen spring 2014, this was a waffle food truck which had chicken and waffles and a few others. The waffles weren't great, they were more of the standard "using pancake batter in a waffle iron" that I've seen everywhere except for home cooking. I think it returned for fall 2014. It is now known as MESS Waffles, but it doesn't even involve a food truck anymore, they opened a permanent location at Century Square.

Vittles - This was seen summer 2014. It was a trailer operated by Gumby's serving sno-cones, pizza rolls, and chicken legs (the latter two obviously prepared off-site).

Chef Tai's Mobile Bistro - Moved inside campus due to a contract.

Southern Comfort Road Trip - The old Village Foods food truck which in fall 2013, was the new home of Hebert's Cajun Food dishes. Their already-borderline prices had gone up, but it still felt like it was putting the universe one step closer to being back in balance. Sadly it didn't last.

Mr. Chinese Burger - I wanted to like it, but the burgers I had tended to be cold..and they were shut down by the health department at least once.They sold pulled pork on chewy steamed buns.

When the tower was built a few years later, BB&T moved back in and by 2019 it had Fajita Pete's, Which Wich, and All Phone Toys, the last one occupying a small suite facing Church Avenue. Unfortunately, both Fajita Pete's and Which Wich have closed, with Fajita Pete's closing in 2021 and Which Wich closing in late 2023. (Also during this time, BB&T rebranded to Truist, following a merger with SunTrust out of Atlanta). On April 20, 2024, Waco viral hit Roni's Mac Bar opened in Suite 200 (the former Which Wich...and Roni's reused much of their fixtures). It is the first branch location and the first not to be connected to a food hall, which the original is.

UPDATE 04-21-24: Full rewrite was done.
UPDATE 04-24-2024: Should've also mentioned Korean chicken chain bb.q Chicken opened in fall 2023 to replace Fajita Pete's.

Handy Burger / The Onion Ring / The Deluxe / Chimy's Cerveceria

Chimy's sign looks kind of cool at night, but no picture of that, sorry (December 2015)

This restaurant, best known to me as the Deluxe Diner, always had a bit of a special place in my heart, even if I never went there. It was the first thing I saw besides the late Dulie Bell Building if we were going down the ramp from Wellborn, plus it was always featured in a little "menu booklet" that the George Bush Library had in their early days. It started as a hamburger restaurant called the Handy Burger (first reference in papers was 1962), which was the first place in town to have a microwave for food use. Around 1979 (give or take a year), this became a restaurant called "The Onion Ring" (which picked up a well-known nickname probably more common than the REAL name of the restaurant).

By 1983 it was "The Deluxe Burger Bar" (renamed The Deluxe Diner sometime later), and at some point to be determined, the restaurant's exterior was remodeled (Handy Burger looked substantially different than what Deluxe looked like).

Deluxe Diner menu from better days (c. 1998), note that this is not the full menu

The shuttered Deluxe Diner, Google Street View (c. 2007)
The Deluxe Diner closed in 2006 (that I know for sure) but by that time was in a state of huge decline (food was terrible, management was even worse). Despite having some period diner pieces inside (though the exterior had been modified since the Handy Burger days), the building started to rot and mold until 2012 when most of the restaurant was demolished save for a few walls and was rebuilt into Chimy's Cerveceria, which opened in January 2013. I've never eaten there, based on reports of overpriced food and what I've seen myself (long, cafeteria-like tables). That was disappointing, as I'd been wanting some decent Tex-Mex in Northgate, not a bar. Rest assured, though, with the opening of Torchy's Tacos when I lived at Eastgate, I no longer thought of Chimy's as a wasted opportunity.

So there you go. The tale of one of College Station's oldest restaurant sites in one post. Sorry for the absence as of late...I'll be wrapping up several more of the posts here with one more for the memories.

UPDATE 12-31-2020: Added Handy Burger's opening date as well as other restuarants.

Former Pizza Inn

Picture taken late October 2015, shortly before rainclouds rolled in and drenched the town.
The rather ragged-looking "Rodney D. Young Insurance" at 413 Texas Avenue, which looks like a candidate for demolition should something better come along (the Exxon at the corner is constantly being ragged on as being an eyesore in a prime location). It was a Pizza Inn (No. 65) opened in 1966 and remained operational until sometime in the mid-1980s (and I'm not sure when Rodney D. Young came in, since I don't have city directories, only a few phone books). In 1989, it was Star Video and by 1993 it was EZ Pawn. As of January 2018, the location is no longer Rodney D. Young Insurance, it is now Legacy Tattoo Lounge.

It's also worth noting that there exists a "Pizza Inn Express" (just a counter) at the Chevron at Holleman and Deacon (opened in fall 2018).

1970s phone book. It still looks remarkably similar.

UPDATE 7-28-2018: Integrated August 10, 2016 edit into main post. Removed two paragraphs irrelevant to the main topic. Added Legacy Tattoo Lounge mention.
UPDATE 2-10-2020: Added mention of "new" Pizza Inn, renamed from "413 Texas Avenue, A Distinctly Former Pizza Inn"
UPDATE 10-27-2020: Added proper opening and store number, as well as some tags.

The Safeway at the Health Department

Boring government building or a disguised old supermarket? You decide!
Cross-posted from Safeway and Albertsons in Texas Blog

In October 1950, Safeway opened store #249 in Bryan, Texas, when they were a much smaller company than they later grew to be. It was likely from the Dallas division originally.

Used to be here! (1960)

Now it's here! (1971)
In the mid-1960s, Safeway rebuilt their store directly behind their old one. The reasoning for this was never fully explained, especially since the store was only 15 years old at the time and there were no serious issues reported in the press (foundation issues, right of way clearance).

In 1986, the store closed, probably to distance from the newly-acquired Weingarten store just a bit down the road. The replacement store would last as a Safeway as just a few years before becoming an AppleTree. It would be the last AppleTree until Kubicek sold out around 2009.

Sometime within the next 5 years of 1986 it was remodeled into the Brazos County Health Department, though I could've sworn that they've done an exterior remodel in recent years--the old one was distinctly grocery store-shaped. Regardless of what they did to the front, there's some rockwork on the side of the store: that's one sign that it was a Safeway, I suppose.

Former Piggly Wiggly at Texas Avenue & Rosemary

The building in its original form as Piggly Wiggly. It doesn't look like this today, thanks to a later facade re-do. Courtesy John Ellisor via Newspapers.com and The Eagle.

Even before the late Luby's served its first piece of fried fish, we had the first local location of Piggly Wiggly across the street from it. First opened in 1963, I can't nail down when it exactly it closed, but it seems to have been around 1980, give or take a year (and why it had an even number despite being on the odd-numbered side of Texas Avenue I don't know).

Piggly Wiggly in our corner of the world was owned by Piggly Wiggly Red River Co., which mostly owned the stores between I-20 and I-10 plus north of Dallas-Fort Worth, including Waco-Temple-Killeen, Conroe, Georgetown, Sherman-Denison, and Bryan-College Station. This was their first area store. In 1983, these stores were sold to local operator Six Star Foods, which kept three stores plus a store in Hearne limping along until they were closed in 1985.

Unfortunately, the Piggly Wiggly here didn't even last to the point where it was sold to Six Star Foods. Instead, the store closed, and in 1981, part of the store (suite B) was reopened as a discount grocery store, Jewel T. Owned by the same company running the Jewel-Osco stores in the Chicago area (and a play on the name "Jewel Tea", their original name), Jewel T was a discount store reportedly similar to Aldi and took residence in older-generation grocery stores. Unfortunately, details are sparse on this elusive store, and it didn't last long. In 1984, The Jewel Companies were bought by American Stores, and Jewel T was sold off to Save-a-Lot, but the Texas division was bought by Grand Prairie-based Shop-N-Sav and renamed Texas-T.

In 1994, Texas-T was bought from them by Save-a-Lot's parent company, SuperValu, and converted to Save-a-Lot (the rest of the Texas T stores were) before closing for good a few years later. It's not surprising if Save-a-Lot closed soon after, a failed stand in College Station is pretty much forgotten (and hey, that was an old Piggly Wiggly, too!)

After Save-a-Lot closed, it became Jacque's Toys & Books, a local upscale "learning toys" store. Now, Jacque's would claim it's been around since 1986 (the "start of business" time), but not in that space. It was originally called "The Toy Box" and located at 3806 South Texas Avenue (later home to Brazos Blind & Draperies) and in suite A from 1990 to 1998, and then jumped to Suite B following Sav-a-Lot's closure. Jacque's closed in September 2016.

If I have my chronology right, the left location (suite A) later became Brazos Valley Christian Books (coincidentally, located at 3808 Texas Avenue in the early 1990s) and later Pack & Mail, which closed in the latter part of the 2000s. It's now been subdivided once more, as you can see in my pictures. Because I don't have actual address-based directories, I haven't been able to ascertain what was in suite A after Piggly Wiggly's departure.

It's important to note that although Piggly Wiggly was at 4300 Texas Avenue, but while the shopping center is still called that, none of the stores have that address (which makes sense, at some point the address was corrected). Even before Sav-a-Lot left, there was one other "grocery store" at the center--at 4303 Texas Avenue (opened in 1988, as long as I can remember), was Brazos Natural Foods. The store had long been a purveyor of organic and gluten free items long before the mainstream supermarkets had them, but the store closed in early 2021. There are also additional storefronts on North Rosemary Street. 700 N. Rosemary is vacant (no clue what was there), 702 N. Rosemary being the long-time home of water purification company Jacob's Well (though the picture on their website is not of this location), and 704 N. Rosemary being Laina Salon (and formerly Nori's Hair Studio, though indications are it essentially renamed...and for a short time was "Nori's Hair Studio & Reflexology). The addresses jump to 710 N. Rosemary, and this was Awards & More, which was located here from 1999 to around the mid-2010s (it has since relocated). Today, the space being occupied by Curious Collections Vinyl Records & More, which has been here since 2017.

The current Google Maps imagery shows Aggieland Preschool Academy at the old Jacque's and Lone Star Quiltworks and BCS Fitness on the left.

UPDATE 07-22-2021: Rename to "Former Piggly Wiggly at Texas Avenue & Rosemary", minor rewrite, especially involving the backstory of some tenants and adding the Rosemary tenants.
UPDATE 06-27-2023: Lone Star Quiltworks closed in February 2023 (owner retired). TexAgs mentions it here.

110-112 Nagle

Despite looking bad, this is about the extent of it.
This building, built in 1963, has seen a lot, including the after-effects of a fire in June 2014, which despite looking worse for the wear, was only quite limited to what to you see here, with Lippman's opening the next day and Jin's the following week.

The Jin's side (110 Nagle) was originally (by the early 1970s, so presumably as opening in 1963) one of the many UtoteM convenience stores in town though it appears that it ceased being UtoteM by 1975. In 1979 it reopened to become the Universal Grocery & Snack Bar, which morphed into Universal Restaurant & Asian Grocery before closing in 1998. From 1999 to early 2002 it was Blimpie (which lost its franchisee because of a second menu serving Indian food). It appears that they changed names before closure, a 2002 listing for "Hungry Hut" does list Indian, Chinese, and sandwiches as its menu options. (Another source lists the restaurant name as "Hungry Hop"; the actual name is unknown at this time). This closed in 2003, with Jin's opening in 2005. I don't have any pictures for Jin's unfortunately, partially because it's fairly common elsewhere (see Yelp, for instance). A friend claims that the Blimpie served an Indian food menu that may have contributed to its eventual closure.

Lippman's side (112 Nagle) opened as Lippman Music in 1994 (guitars and such, not albums) after moving from Culpepper Plaza (where it opened in the 1980s) but according to Brian Lippman served as a bus station in the distant past (the double doors that don't open was a freight entrance). From 1987 to 1994 it was the original location of Notes-N-Quotes before it moved to the old Exxon next door.

In May 2017, Lippman Music closed permanently when Brian Lippman retired, with Jin's closing soon after, fueling speculation the building would be redeveloped. The building was repainted (but not otherwise touched), and by mid-2018 two new tenants were operating, BonAppeTea (112) and Nam Cafe (110).

UPDATE 08-06-2021: The fifth update to this post adds some new dates and a link to the Notes-N-Quotes article. Also thanks to "J.M." for the information on Blimpie posted a few updates back.

Redmond Terrace Shopping Center / Texas Avenue Crossing

Author's picture from August 2019. The overcast makes the buildings appear shadowed.
Among the retail establishments off of Texas Avenue is Texas Avenue Crossing (a name not seen on signage, by the way) is also the only strip center for miles around with rooftop parking. If you have lived in College Station for more than six months, you've probably been here: it has (as of this writing) a Panda Express, Cold Stone, World Market, Bed Bath & Beyond, Jason's Deli, and DoubleDave's. Of course, it wasn't always like that, and prior to 2003 (roughly), it was a completely different center. Opening in the 1960s at Jersey and Texas Avenue on a dairy farm, Redmond Terrace Shopping Center was the first strip center in College Station and featured a variety of stores, including a Ben Franklin five and ten, Brookshire Brothers, a post office, and Gibson's. All of these were housed under a continuous "squiggly roof" (not unlike the defunct discount store The Treasury). Here's one of the few photos I have of the original configuration, from a photo of a photo.

Gibson's, of course, was the main anchor. When this article was originally published in 2014, no Wikpedia article existed, but now it does. The Dallas stores even included full supermarkets in theirs. While the Gibson's here never contained such a thing, it did include a garden center and pharmacy, the latter indicated by this December 1971 ad from our very own The Eagle. It may have even had a snack bar.

Get "Monoply" for the kids!

From what I've read, though, Gibson's was a dump (I've heard someone tell me it smelled like tires). If we fast-forward, things started to change at Redmond Terrace...as stores changed, the squiggly roof went away, but only partially, leaving the center very disjointed looking. Academy would demolish or extensively renovate the Gibson's space. The Brookshire Brothers space was replaced with Piggly Wiggly early on (it was not very large at all, much smaller than Navasota's or Hearne's Brookshire Brothers), though Brookshire Brothers did get another chance in College Station when it opened a new store on George Bush Drive West many years later. The post office was replaced with Joe's Used Books.

Compared to the top picture, this is how it's supposed to look color-wise. (Picture by author, 8/19)
Jason's Deli (a Stacy's Furniture for a time, by address) would be on the far right of the center. Other stores included Burdett & Son's and Loupot's, as well as a mattress/furniture liquidator. Here's a picture of Burdett & Son's, in which you can see the original figuration as well.

Burdett & Son was here from 1997 to 2002, as says their website. Copy Corner is off to the right.

At the corner of George Bush and Texas was a Shell gas station with a Zip'N convenience store, but it was extremely small (or am I just remembering this wrong?). This went first with little more than some remains in a raised section of concrete to show that something was here.

Here's the directory listings for what the center was like as Redmond Terrace.

1400 - Stand-alone Zip'N gas station (Shell) at the corner of George Bush (Jersey) and Texas Avenue. May have replaced an older gas station, only 1,000 square feet. This went first with little more than some remains in a raised section of concrete to show that something was here.
1710 George Bush Drive - Not part of the 1400 block, but Joe's Books in the late 1990s was the closest to the George Bush side.
1402 - Brown's Shoe Fit from sometime in the 1980s to the early 2000s
1404 - Copy Corner
1404A - Jason's Deli. I remember how Jason's Deli was one of the last buildings to be torn down, and the first to be rebuilt.
1406 - Piggly Wiggly in 1976, and later Burdett & Sons by 1997 (to 2002)
1408 - The directory for 1998 lists "Vincent AC" or something like that, but I only remember a mattress liquidator being here.
1410 - AR Photography
1418 - Gibson's Discount Center in 1976 and Academy by the mid-1980s. By the 1990s it was rebadged as 1420, possibly due to an expansion in the late 1980s.
1422 - Loupot's Book Store. This moved to the center at Holleman and Texas Avenue and is a Salata today. This appears to be originally part of Gibson's, and originally had a south entrance (unknown if it was re-sealed later) for a garden center.

In 2001, Redmond Terrace would lose its largest anchor when Academy announced it would move out to the bypass (the new store opened February 2002, a store now closed and replaced by an even larger one), and shortly thereafter it was announced that the entire shopping center would be wrecked for a new center: Texas Avenue Crossing. While one portion was saved and rehabbed (Mattress Giant and Pier One Imports, and I think this was where Jason's Deli originally was), the rest was demolished and built anew, featuring a mostly stable line-up of tenants.

On top of Bed Bath & Beyond to Jason's Deli is that rooftop parking area, but it's never been very full. An elevator takes you back near BB&B.

Over at the Shell spot, a new plaza was built with Panda Express (new to the market), Complete Nutrition (formerly "Bath Junkie"), James Avery Craftsman (originally something else?), and Cold Stone Creamery (new to the market).

TAC remains rather popular, having brought new retailers to the market and a popular lunch spot with inexpensive restaurants (Jason's Deli, particularly, remains a popular after-church spot).

Here's the current directory.

1400 - Panda Express in the strip center that replaced the Shell.
1404 - Formerly Bath Junkie from 2005 to 2009, later Complete Nutrition. Bath Junkie may or may not have been one of the first to go in here. (1402 not used)
1406 - James Avery jewelry store. May or may not have replaced another ~2005 tenant.
1408 - Cold Stone Creamery.
1410 - DoubleDave's Pizzaworks at the north end of the center.
1414 - European Wax Center (1412 not used), originally Urban Salon.
1416 - Charming Charlie. For some reason I remember this coming after the other stores, but I can't remember if it replaced anything. It was one of the first of that chain open (the chain launched in 2004, and this was only store #5 out of nearly 400). In August 2019, the store and the 260 other stores in the chain (at the time) announced it would go out of business.
1418 - Formerly Mattress Giant and later transformed into another MattressFirm location (it happened not long after they had built a store at the former Blockbuster at Holleman)
1424 - Pier 1 Imports, moved from space near the mall. This announced closing in early 2020 shortly before Pier 1 filed for bankruptcy protection. 1420 and 1422 not used.
1430 - Bed Bath & Beyond. 1424-1428 not used.
1440 - Pine Boutique. For years Ritz Camera & Image, closed in 2012, one of the last ones to close. 1432-1438 not used.
1446 - Palm Beach Tan (originally Darque Tan for years)
1450 - Total Wine & More opened in 2022. Formerly World Market. 1448 not used.
1460 - Jason's Deli. 1452-1458 not used.

UPDATE 09-15-2021: World Market began going out of business sales in December 2020, putting the screws to yet another business in the center. Also updated Bath Junkie's dates and implied that Brookshire Bros. would be covered in the future.
UPDATE 02-17-2023: Added Total Wine & More.
UPDATE 02-10-2024: Some updates to report that have not been integrated to the page. DoubleDave's announced on TexAgs that the George Bush/Texas location would close May 1, 2023. Also, in late July 2023 Bed Bath & Beyond closed with the bankruptcy of the chain and was replaced with Burlington (formerly known as Burlington Coat Factory, but like At Home the store opened too late for CS to see the "original" name). I still do have a few pictures of the strip center pre-remodel but that will have to wait.

PLAY Gaming Café

Taken June 2014.

Once a Planned Parenthood location a long time ago (likely something else, built in 1964), this is now a bar (Cedar Lane, another bar is in the back), but the focus is on PLAY Gaming Café, which was open around 2005 and advertised at Hastings (another now-defunct establishment). The College Main location was tucked out of sight from the main Northgate establishments, and related parking problems didn't help. From the comments, I have this quote from "downhillcrasher", "I remember Play pretty well, they had everything from the latest games to old school nintendo. Almost everything that is. What didn't they have? Cheap beer. And what do you need to make it in Northgate? Cheap beer." The archived website website sort of works, but almost nothing remains of it on the Wayback Machine save for a Flash intro video and a page of the forums (appropriately, from 2005).\

303 College Main

Reed McDonald Building

It's game over for Dulie Bell, but another generally unloved building has been getting some facade work recently. Reed-McDonald Building, the long-time home to the Battalion (it was there 15 years ago and years before that) and a current place to store grad students. Built in 1967, as of winter 2013, this has been getting a repaint, getting some blonde tan, covering up the battered and faded red paint (which is apparently was used/is being used as a primer) and slightly less battered dark tan color. As of this writing, it's mostly done.

Older Aggies that went here prior to 2006 may notice that something's missing: the Bus Stop Snack Bar, which sold things like sandwiches and chips. Regrettably, I don't have any pictures of the missing building, but you can discuss it here.

ALSO! We went added and added a newspaper article for the opening of Weingarten (College Station) location. You know, the one that lasted two months and never even became a Safeway?

Torchy's Tacos

Once again, my phone's camera interprets red neon as having a harsh orange effect. (September 2014)
I originally wrote this post about 1037 Texas Avenue South in January 2014. At the time, it was the recently-closed Sully's Sports Bar & Grill, and the restaurant had some difficult times in recent years with a revolving door of restaurants over the years. Sully's (née Fowl Digits) had been one of many, many failures over the years and was somewhat of a "cursed" location. But now that Torchy's has been here for almost a decade and still draws consistent crowds, did it break the curse? Probably. But how old is the building anyway?

Here's a bit from The Eagle from its 1962 groundbreaking as "Coach Norton's Pancake House", the first restaurant in the spot.

Coach Homer Norton, coach of the 1939 Texas Aggie national football champions, and his wife expect to break ground Monday or Tuesday for a $200,000 restaurant on Highway 6 in College Station. Norton, 56, was in the city Wednesday and today, making final arrangements for the groundbreaking of the establishment to be known as "Coach Norton’s Pancake House." The approximately 200-capacity edifice will be constructed on the corner of Highway 6 and Kyle Street in College Station. The former Aggie coach has a similar business in Rosenberg—-gathering place for members of the '39 champs when A&M is playing football in Houston. Norton officially announced the new B-CS restaurant, which is to be completed in about four months, today. R. B. Butler is general contractor for the restaurant. "I've been looking forward to this for a long time," Norton stated. "Actually I feel like I’m coming home. We have many close, dear friends in College Station, Bryan and throughout the state. So many of them travel in and out of College Station it’s going be a great chance to visit. Actually I dreamed of this long before I quit coaching," the white-haired Aggie mentor said. "I always wanted to do two things; own a motel and a real high class eating place." After a 14-year tenure as head coach at A&M, Norton resigned the post in 1947 and opened his motel business in Rosenberg, "This place will be my big prize," he added, "and I imagine it will be the largest and finest of its kind between Dallas and Houston." The 200-seat restaurant will feature 25 varieties of Norton’s nationally famous pancakes as well as steak, shrimp, chicken and other foods. Completely carpeted throughout, the pancake house will provide the finest of kitchen equipment and fixtures, according to Norton, with all-around parking and an eight-foot covered walkway on the sides and front. Norton indicated a manager would be in charge of the establishment, as in Rosenberg, and that he would commute from Rosenberg. Coach Norton stated he would probably spend most of his time in College Station, however. The building was to be lined off today and set on the lot for construction to get under way immediately.

Sadly, Norton would not see his new restaurant for very long, as Homer Norton would pass away in 1965, but his legacy still stood (the motel in Rosenberg existed as the Homer Norton Motel for many years, though around 2016 was renamed as the Lone Star Inn). The Pancake House in College Station had a much shorter life. Without Norton at the helm (and the hopes for a chain restaurant dashed), it ended up closing around late 1969 or early 1970. The building still stood, however.

A phone book advertisement for Coach Norton's, showing the original sign. Note the triangle-shaped sign base. One of the first restaurants to reoccupy was Fontana's Italian-Mexican Restaurant (we'll come back to this later). The first reference to Fontana's appeared in 1970, not long at all after the demise of the Pancake House. Like the later incarnation, Fontana's would specialize primarily in Italian and newspaper references to Fontana's would continue into the late 1970s.

In 1980, Mama's Pizza moved from 609 Texas where Oakridge Steakhouse had been (the building was eventually demolished in the mid-1990s for the shopping center).

Here's where things get complicated. Mama's Pizza left sometime in the late 1980s for the end cap restaurant space at Culpepper Plaza, 1601 Texas Avenue, and from there, the building would have a revolving door of restaurants. In the following sections, I will try to best address what I can find and how long they lasted.

Rockyano's Pizza, which later was shut down for tax evasion reasons, opened in August 1991 (it seems the building was shut down for a few years), though because it was shut down for tax reasons, it's unknown when exactly it closed. (relevant post on TexAgs).

In mid-1992, the building finally stopped being a pizza restaurant when it became Shanghai Restaurant (later renamed/changed hands to Shen Zhen Restaurant sometime in mid-1995) but closed by the end of the year. This is another point of contention--a 1993 directory (but not a 1993 phone book) lists "Shanghai Chinese Restaurant" as well as a 1996 directory, however, a TexAgs poster claims that it was open for a "week or two", which seems to be a gross exaggeration. Did Shen Zhen serve sushi like the forum thread implies? Probably not. A lot of places and times get transposed when it comes to this.

When it moved in around early 1996, successor restaurant Porky's Hamburger & Onion Ring Company officially was in business for three months but had already moved twice since its founding in 1994 in Fredericksburg, first to Round Rock, then to College Station. Officially, the restaurant only operated for about three months but eyewitnesses report it was only open for "six weeks" (after all, Front Porch Grill didn't last a long time either).

Snuffer's opened in February 1997 per ribbon cutting information from the Chamber of Commerce, a branch of the Snuffer's restaurant chain out of Dallas. Unfortunately, not too long after that, that part of Texas Avenue began widening and within eight months, they got "snuffed out" by the construction.

Nearly a year after the closure of Snuffers, there was El Arroyo (1998-1999). Following this, there were two restaurants and I'm not sure either of them opened. I've found listings for "Gin Seng Garden" that only lasted for a month as well as "Nari Inc." (unknown to what the restaurant was).

La Familia del Mar, a Mexican seafood restaurant that operated in spring 2001, was operated by the same owners of La Familia Taqueria. This is the one in the TexAgs post, that refers to "maybe something-Del Mar".

Another buffet, the Hong Kong Buffet would follow, in late 2001 and early 2002 (no confirmation here)....followed by El Ranchito Mexican Restaurant (again, no confirmation).

Cazadores Mexican Restaurant (#4, actually had other locations including Houston) was here from 2003 to 2009 was the next one here, but actually making it a few years was an accomplishment.

From Fontana's Facebook page, which itself was from ShopBrazos.com, which has since taken down this image
Fontana's Authentic Italian Food operated from 2009 to 2011. This was actually the same owner of the "first" Fontana's here that opened some 40 or so years earlier but it was too little, too late, to work off any nostalgia.

In early 2012, a restaurant called Fowl Digits opened in the building, now fifty years old. Fowl Digits looked to be different than the other restaurants. Stucco was added to the building, the "triangular" sign was restored, there was a huge marketing blitz, there was the whole promoting the business as part of "Chicken Strip Row" (with Layne's and Raising Cane's on either side of them), and...it was a huge failure. Part of the problem was they didn't know their own marketing—a drink coozie I still have states that it's a "sports bar disguised as a chicken finger place"...and the prices were more expensive to match (inflation of course makes Fowl Digits seem cheap in retrospect) but it was too expensive, and the only other thing it had was dozens of televisions with different channels (not just sports, one was on Boomerang which even then was showing 1990s programming during daytime hours). That's not even mentioning its failure as a bar as well, beer was only served in plastic cups.

Around October 2012, Fowl Digits closed and was retooled into "Sully's Sports Grill & Bar" with another new coat of paint. That seemed to do better for them (even if the name switch seemed pretty desperate) as the menu expanded to add things like hamburgers. It still wasn't enough to gain a following (and reviews were mixed). In the end, Sully's closed in December 2013, once again, becoming another failed restaurant in the spot. I was able to get a few pictures during this time--you can see the Fowl Digits/Sully's patio shortly after it closed in late 2013 with side view.

Enter Torchy's Tacos. Based out of Austin, Torchy's did extensive work to the property. After the rumor of Torchy's was confirmed in early 2014, in summer, the demolition of Sully's commenced. It wasn't a total demolition (nor was it the "everything but a few walls" demolition that happened to the Deluxe Diner or Egg Roll House) but did strip off nearly every element that the Fowl Digits/Sully's owners added on, including exposing the Fontana metal siding before replacing that too. It also dismantled the 1960s era triangular sign for the purposes of more outdoor seating, instead opting to have a large sign facing Texas Avenue with a huge colorful neon sign with the "baby devil" logo. It officially opened October 16, 2014 to huge crowds and has been here for nine years, more than any restaurant had been there in the twenty years prior.
• Torchy's September 2014. Almost the exact same view of the Sully's side view above. Compare and contrast!
• Looking in
• A closer look at the red and white. These are road reflectors!
• Inside--the soda fountain dispensers.
• For some reason, the menu boards were replaced before opening.

UPDATE 06-24-2023: After previously being updated September 2014 (new title, photos, and substantial information), July 2015 (further integration), and August 2016 (part of site upgrades), this latest update is a major rewrite which adds more information on the Homer Norton Motel in Rosenberg, some more defunct restaurants, and so forth. The post title was renamed to simply "Torchy's Tacos". UPDATE 02-16-2024: A few tiny updates. Integrated address back into the article.

The Best Little Creamery in Aggieland

During better days. Dairy Sales inside! (Cushing Memorial Archives)
The Meat Center, as discussed the other day, is a most definitely unique place on campus, where you can buy real cuts of meat (lamb, pork, and beef) as well as dried meat products (the jerky is famous, but do try the dried sausage). It's also good in the sense that it wasn't outsourced with the rest of the establishments (A meal plan never could be used at the meats center (and most certainly not today), but a long time ago, there was more than Aggie-butchered meat you could buy. It was also ice cream! The "Dairy Science" building (also dairy sales) was located on Spence Street between modern-day Heep Laboratory Building (not Heep Center, that's different) and the Pavilion. There was also an older "Creamery" (that physically looked a bit like the Pavilion) that was demolished on West Campus in the mid-1980s (right on the other side of the railroad, where Old Main is today...yes, it even remained after the semi-circle of Olsen was built, and all that). That is not the subject of this post.

Cushing Memorial Archives

The dairy manufacturing building (the Main Campus one, at least) was demolished in 1995 for what would eventually be the Central Campus Parking Garage (the facade was where the main entrance off of Spence is). Just a few years prior, the dairy had been featured in Southern Living as part of a small page on Texas A&M with a small picture of the dairy/creamery's inside. While this article is still framed at the Meats Center, it has faced the window for years (thus, becoming quite faded) and the picture was never very large anyway. If you know of any interior pictures of the building featured in this post, please tell us.

It wasn't a spiteful move that the dairy manufacturing building was demolished, though, as a new modern creamery building was built soon after on Discovery Drive, in West Campus. However, the facility was never actually used as a dairy manufacturing plant since another group needed it more and the dairy group lost funding. It's still a bitter issue to this day for many involved. This turned out to be the Electron Beam facility, a food irradiation facility that partnered with a private company called SureBeam. Unfortunately, food irradiation in general never took off because "consumer safety groups" (read: professional scaremongers) convinced the public with the false notion that food irradiation was bad ("it has radiation in the name! oh noes!") and SureBeam paid the price for it (going bankrupt in January 2004). After a second short-lived partnership with another food irradiation company and some internal shakeups that resulted in a lot of the TAMU employees leaving the facility, the electron beam facility was never utilized properly again. Hopefully we can get back to the electron beam facility another time, but the real end point was that A&M didn't have a creamery after the demo, and thus, no homemade ice cream. I don't even know if you can get Blue Bell on campus anymore: I haven't been inside Sbisa proper in at least a year, the two places that served Blue Bell: Common Grounds and Bernie's Café, have both closed.

The thing that burns the most is that LSU does still have a creamery and serves it at campus dining location (and yes, they too have Chartwells doing the dining). Are we going to let LSU make their own ice cream without having our superior version?

The answer is yes for the time being...

Mr. Gatti's on Northgate

One of the new restaurants of University Square was Mr. Gatti's (opening 1974), which had the tagline of "The best pizza in town (Honest)", and by all accounts, it was a decent pizza place. It had two levels, cold beer, and, as the ad above indicates, did have live entertainment (like a pre-fame Lyle Lovett). For nearly two decades, Mr. Gatti's thrived at 107 College Avenue.

The "pizzamat" (817 University Drive), as indicated above, was a take-out pizza and beer building and had the address of 817 University Drive. It is now the home of the little drive-through ATM (First National Bank?) which was Mt. Aggie Snow Cones in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The pizzamat replaced, and had the same address as the "Rao Drive Inn", an extremely cool looking drive-in straight out of the 1950s, was closed and torn down in the early part of the 1970s.

"54" is scribbled on the side. Did it open in 1954? (from Historic Brazos County: An Illustrated Journey)


By 1996, Mr. Gatti's (by now the only one left in town, the Bryan one having been closed for a time, it was now China Garden) finally was closed and replaced with Gattiland, as the ad below indicates (how do I know it's 1996? Check the bottom picture). Gattiland wasn't anywhere near the old Mr. Gatti's, as it was in Bryan some miles up. It didn't even cater to the same clientele at all (though Mr. Gatti's arguably was heading this direction, a buffet wasn't offered in the 1970s), and the story of that restaurant from here on out would only get worse...

Shortly afterwards, the building was torn down, and in 1997, a new Schlotzsky's Deli (now just Schlotzsky's) was built on the spot.

Prior to dropping the "Deli" and adding Cinnabon. The patio has been expanded since then (2012). From Stalworth's website.



Edit 1/16/14: Added opening date, will make another update when Gattiland article is added.
2/14/14: link added
May 2019: Updates made.

Northpoint Crossing

One of the coveted corners of this building is taken by a small convenience store, and not even a big name. (Picture by author, 1/20)

This post was originally written as "Other Buildings Demolished for Northpoint Crossing", as I intended to write a full article for the new development, and some of this content originally been part of the Plaza Hotel article a long time ago. Later I did make a Northpoint Crossing article, but at that point it was little more than a picture, as burnout had settled in.

Today, the Northpoint Crossing complex is composed of six large apartment buildings, some of which have retail space. The retail space never really took off, with notable exceptions. World of Beer (opened September 2015) sits on the corner of Texas and University in the 425 Northpoint Crossing building. Minuti Coffee opened at 424 Northpoint Crossing, the next building down, around the same time. The first tenant was actually a location of Toastie's Sub Shops out of Austin opening in spring 2015 but closing a year later (coincidentally, around the same time an Austin location was locked out for lack of lease payment, and by January 2017, the Toastie's chain, was, well, toast. In June 2018 it became Smallcakes Cupcakery & Creamery. Elsewhere in the 424 building but at Northpoint Lane and a road what we can only assume is also "Northpoint Crossing" a Gateway Newstands convenience store opened.

The Clubhouse is for residents only, standard for student apartment complexes. (Picture by author, 1/20)

What about the places before Northpoint Crossing? That's what you came for.

This represents the area circa 2011. Ignore the building marked as "2", it was covered in the main Ramada Inn article.
1. This was originally a Gulf station, opening too long after the Ramada, with a garage. It was kept relatively updated, with the only known change being turned into a Chevron in the late 1980s, which gave it a re-do on the trim from red-orange tiles to the early 1990s-era Chevron blue-and-gray. This was, of course, due to Gulf Oil being bought by Standard Oil of California in 1985. Standard Oil of California changed its name later that year to reflect its flagship brand, Chevron.

This particular Chevron gas station was finally shut down in the mid-2000s and torn down circa 2007. I don't remember the garage specifically, however--it's possible that it was converted into a convenience store in the 1990s (but I have no proof of that). Some older phone books refer to this as "Piper's Gulf (later "Chevron", of course) Service Center". The address of this was 420 Texas Avenue. A decent enough picture of the gas station (Chevron) can be seen at the main Ramada Inn article.



3. This was was built as a UtoteM convenience store, once extremely common across town and the state. It became a Circle K in 1984 with the buy-out of the chain (and was already closed by 1989 following Circle K's massive retraction). Later on by 2007, it became "Ink Dreams", and a few years later, "Oasis Pipes & Tobacco". The address was 1405 University Drive. I don't have the full history of the building, however. In July 2013, I discovered in 1995, it was listed as "Sterling Automotive". Since the lot of the former UtoteM is pretty small, it's likely that this was either just a showroom or the old parking lot behind it (as seen) was used for Sterling, and not for University Tower. Oasis moved to Eastgate after it was evicted. There's a back portion of this, I don't know if the buildings were physically connected or if it was just an additional office space area off of Meadowlands.

4. 1403 University Drive held a Kettle restaurant, dating back to at least 1980. Distinctive because the yellow and black P A N C A K E S sign, it closed sometime in the 1990s (it was open at least into 1998, so that's the date I'm going to go with). While the Kettle signage disappeared several years before its demise, the PANCAKES sign (not unlike the Waffle House logo, which it's often confused with) was very distinctive. Kettle sold the property in 2004 to Leonard Ross (Rossco), which like other properties he owned just deteriorated until it was sold to the Northpoint Crossing developers in 2011.

Regarding these two I have two Google Maps Street View photos, one from 2011 and one from 2007 (it shouldn't be too hard to tell which one is which). It also clearly shows the P A N C A K E S sign, so if you have any doubt that it was a Waffle House, you can dispel them, because we never had one and from the likes of it won't be getting one anytime soon (let's be realistic here).

6. These were some apartment buildings colloquially known as the Meadowland Apartments,
Originally part of another development called North Park (and the building out of the rest of Meadowland Road), the Meadowland Apartments (6) were (likely) built in the 1980s and were owned by the same owners of University Tower at one time. I'm guessing these were closed in 2005-2006, but I don't know for sure. I believed them to be located at 701 University, but later evidence suggested that they had individual addresses per building, which I haven't found yet. Remarkably, a few still stand: I guess that Northpoint Crossing never managed to get all of them. At least one of them was demolished for the "Home2 Suites by Hilton" hotel. The two today are fourplexes with 1402 Northpoint Lane and 1404 Northpoint Lane, but these have been changed. They weren't originally 1402-1404 Meadowland.

5. This was the only remaining house left on the block, 125 Meadowland. This was taken out for the redevelopment. It looks like it had a second structure behind it: possibly additional bedrooms. I had some friends who lived in Eastgate around the time I originally wrote this post, wherein at least two lived in the main house, and at least one lived in a shack behind it. I'm not sure if that was even allowed via ordinances.



7. This was a 1960s-era building has seen a few things come and go. The address was 100 Texas Avenue South.

The mid-mod building started out as the Dutch Kettle Snack Bar (*not* related to the Kettle restaurant on University) there at Hensel and Texas, and probably one of the first (if not the first) 24 hour eateries in College Station. Alas, while other 24 hours eateries benefitted from the Plaza implosion such as Fuego and Denny's, this did not, as had been closed for years (even as the donut shop, which was decidedly NOT 24 hours). In the late 1970s, it became Schlotzsky's (one of the first franchised locations), though a 1976 article suggests that a short-lived location at 808 East Villa Maria Road may have been the first), and remained as such for years, even into the 1990s). By 1980, this store and a Culpepper Plaza store was in place (unknown address for Culpepper Plaza). By the late 1990s up to the mid-2000s, it was "Snowflake Donuts", which closed without much notice well prior to the demolition of the area (presumably after Schlotzsky's moved closer to Northgate . This was, as John Ellisor has mentioned, a chain, and even today, a a sibling store is off of Gulf Freeway in Houston. The Houston location was heavily modified at some point in the past while the College Station one was virtually untouched...but the Houston one still stands with its dual chimneys. Later on, this became the leasing office for Northpoint Crossing where it continued to use the address.


Not mine, originally from a Brazos County history book


Street View of the restaurant shortly before demolition

Updated January 2020 to include actual Northpoint Crossing information along with some other stuff

Former Cooks and Kroger Family Center

Did I mention I have an ad for ammunition sold here?
Most of the modern Kroger "Marketplace" stores in Houston and Dallas (as well as beyond, and including other Kroger brands including King Soopers, Fry's, and Smith's) all come from Fred Meyer, a company based out of the Pacific Northwest Kroger bought in 1998, featuring a full line of merchandise, including clothing, hard goods, jewelry, and of course, food.

Years before Kroger even involved itself with Fred Meyer, Kroger began an experiment to make a true "supercenter" with a full line of products including apparel and sporting goods. Most of the early of the early stores were closed or converted by the early 1970s to traditional Kroger stores but the Houston-area stores were an exception, with Kroger Family Centers going all the way down to the border.

Before we get into the history of this Kroger, the store at 2104 South Texas Avenue opened in 1969 as Cooks Discount Department Store, owned by Cleveland-based Cook United. Due to CU's rather spotty growth across the nation and already distracted with diversification ventures, Cooks closed in the late 1970s and was renovated into Kroger Family Center in 1977. (Cook United would file for bankruptcy in 1984 and cease to exist by 1987).

The Kroger Family Center replaced a smaller store at Manor East Mall with the store opening in 1977. with a wider selection of merchandise.

Store facade as it appeared in 2004, featuring the modified facade

While the "full line" continued into fall 1985 (and long after many of the other Kroger Family Center stores had closed, like Victoria's), it wasn't too long after that the store remodeled to resemble the then-common "greenhouse" facade and the merchandise mix altered to have the basic Kroger "food and drug" mix, much like what the College Station store had.

The strangest fact is that there appears to be a significant gap between the closure of this store and the opening of the next, a Kroger Signature store at 2303 Boonville Road. Usually when a store moves, either both remain open (briefly), it can open next day, or a total closure for two weeks. But from the way it looks, it looks like it was closed for about three months.

The new Kroger opened in April 2006 but no mention was of the older store, because when the news came when the short-lived Bryan Albertsons closed, it was mentioned that the Kroger had closed in late 2005. Combined with the fact that the new Kroger isn't meant to really appeal to the same crowd as the Kroger it replaced, it suggests that the Kroger was a loser store but Kroger still wanted to stay in the area.

A few years after the store closed, it was renovated into "Bryan Square Shopping Center". The "fake greenhouse" was retained for the 99 Cents Only Store but the rest of the facade was remodeled. Other stores added in front of the store were Citi Trends and the Dollar Floor Store. Interestingly, a small building on the south side (at Post Office Street and Cavitt) with some smaller tenants still remains, as well as part of the original Cooks/Kroger facade next to it.

UPDATE 04-21-2024: Sometime between 2022 and 2023 99 Cents Only Store departed (just as well since as of this writing they're closing all their remaining stores, and definitely those in Texas) and A&M Furniture replaced it (relocating from their location at another defunct supermarket. (A previous article overhaul was done in 2020). This update also changed the name ("Kroger Family Center, Bryan" to "Former Cooks and Kroger Family Center")

University Apartments and Century Square

Trendy mixed-use right in the heart of the city! (Picture by author, 2/20)

This post was originally written as "University Apartments", which focused on the group of university-owned apartments that were largely torn down around 2014 for what we now know as Century Square. Initially, I had no interest in covering Century Square as I had updated the post to my standards at the time to wrap up the site (it's why there's an eight month gap between the last 2014 post and the first 2015 post). As a result, this covers the predecessor of Century Square, the University Apartments, first, and we'll progress to the present day and the current occupier of the site.

During my time at A&M, I was thankful that I had enough sense to photograph many buildings on their way out in terms of demolition or extensive renovation. I didn't get enough pictures of the old Scoates Hall, and no inside shots of Dulie Bell, but did get pictures of The Commons, Zachry Engineering Center, Read Building, G. Rollie White, and of course, these.

When making this post originally (or at least doing a significant update), I had done research at Cushing Memorial Library, which refers to Battalion articles that aren't available to be linked. Some of the links that were available, dating from the mid-2000s have been removed from the Battalion's webpage (with no Archive.org to rescue them, I didn't have enough sense back then to archive my links).

Originally rows and rows of two-level Army-style barracks filling up the diagonal-row roads in the early 1950s, with two complexes, College View and Southside, a federal grant in 1957 (to the tune of 2.5 million dollars, which would be about 20 million today) allowed more to be built.

From what I could tell, the original College View Apartments were Army-style barracks filling up the diagonal-row roads east of Northgate built in the early 1950s (at the same time Southside was built, which appeared to have been at the northeast corner of Wellborn and modern-day George Bush Drive, more on that another day).

In 1960, the Hensel Apartments (later Hensel Terrace Apartments) were built, and originally not air-conditioned (until likely the 1970s). The new College View Apartments, built in 1969, were built facing FM 60 and according to The Battalion were "cool, comfortable, and complete", being climate controlled at 70 degrees.

Interestingly, despite the new College View apartments replacing the old College View buildings on a 1:1 basis, only about 7 buildings were built. Nearly 30 others were torn down (a few lasting into the early 1980s, a footnote at a document called "Brazos Valley Chronology" at Project HOLD, mentions the last of these were removed in 1982) without replacement, and until the Century Square development, those spaces remained vacant, possibly due to lack of funding. The back 13 were redeveloped into Avenue A Apartments on a 1:1 replacement, but it was still a lot of vacant space. The 1970s also saw the construction of College Avenue Apartments, which were directly across College Avenue from University Square Shopping Center.

As time went on, the Married Student Housing became known as the "University Apartments", as it started to become known for international students as well. The maintenance of the apartments declined and the roads started to deteriorate, but there wasn't any major trouble. Piecemeal improvements were made to the complex, including the addition of the Becky Gates Children's Center, a 1997 addition on Hensel that would have childcare for students married with children. Later on a community center and playground were built as well. However, it was an incident in 2004 that did change the University Apartments forever.

One day in July 2004, residents complained about a smell of natural gas in the Hensel Terrace Apartments. The maintenance worker responded but decided to not repair the leak until the next week (in fact, they told residents to close their windows, thus making the smell inside worse). Saquib Ejaz, a resident of those apartments, lived with his wife and daughter at Hensel Apartments. His parents were visiting from Bangladesh. While his parents, wife (who was pregnant with another child), and daughter were home, the gas somehow ignited and fire consumed the apartment's interior, severely burning all four. His wife and father survived, but his daughter and mother did not. Other apartments were damaged, as well, however; the structure itself survived.

Lawsuits were filed, and by 2005, a number of new improvements were announced, including new stoves, new detectors, and much better maintenance. This still wasn't "enough" maintenance, as the apartment complex was still falling apart, with the College Avenue Apartments on Ball Street having unleveled floors.

However, by fall 2006, a plan was approved to add the Gardens at University, which, instead of building it on vacant land, would replace the existing apartments. When I first wrote this article in 2012, the College Avenue Apartments had been demolished in 2011 (without replacement), and two-thirds of the Hensel Terrace Apartments (including the rebuilt apartments where Ejaz's apartment was) had been torn down for the Gardens. Nothing else had been altered since then.

In early 2013 "Campus Pointe", a long-planned redevelopment of the area, was trotted out again and approved. This would essentially lease the university's land to a private developer, becoming one of the few shopping malls built on property leased from a university (Stanford Shopping Center is another example).

College View Apartments, Hensel Terrace Apartments, and Avenue A Apartments were marked for destruction--all residents had to move out. There were even stories of the mattresses being moved out first, so many had to make do with sleeping on the floor, and a new field designated for playing cricket (popular as most of the residents came from overseas) had to be closed. Despite (presumably) assistance, the apartments all near campus had much higher rent, and both Northgate and Southgate had undergone some degree of gentrification.

While The Gardens, the daycare, and the maintenance building were not affected and still stand, the demolition for redevelopment seemed to take a long time, for months, the abandoned apartments (speckled with graffiti) stood, then for many more months with just vacant land. Sometime during all of this, Campus Pointe was renamed to Century Square.

A friend and I took these in May 2013, soon before eviction in summer 2013 (the picture at the title is also from that):

Nobody's home.

Avenue A Apartments, which has eight units per building, four of which are seen here.

There is so much open space here, great for large group games or tossing a Frisbee around. Too bad this will go away...

College View Apartments. These face University Drive.

Hensel Terrace Apartments. Most of these are already gone, including the unit that exploded in 2004. It's worth noting that the building wasn't actually destroyed. The apartments have concrete foundations and despite being old and run-down, are better built then similar apartment complexes of the same era.

The Gardens at University Apartments. These will stick around.

Interesting vents on the University Apartments Maintenance Building.
For the next few years, the entire area was gated off as new construction began to take over, opening as Century Square.

The center would open in phases, with many of the restaurants coming in-line by fall 2017 (the hotels opened sooner). I haven't actually been to most of what Century Square has to offer...the parking is a major issue, in an effort to be more like Houston high-end development, the developers instituted paid parking everywhere except the garage (which also once had a strict time limit for staying).

The "mall space" is composed of a bunch of buildings floating in parking lots. As the way I'm going to explain it is going to be confusing, I recommend you look at the PDF directory to understand the layout. It's an archived version, and will go increasingly out of date as time goes on, but the link should stay up.

1025 University Drive - Located at the corner of the development, closest to the College Drive/University intersection, this building has, from left to right, Mo's Irish Pub (opened May 2018), Orangetheory Fitness, Sharetea, Merge Boutique, Clean Juice, and Piada Italian Street Food (opened summer 2017). I ate at Mo's Irish Pub not too long after it opened, it was an airy, modern space with cute waitresses, but average food with only a few token "Irish" dishes.

1099 University Drive - This is almost the same building as 1025 University Drive except there's a covered open-air walkway between them. This building has three tenants, Velvet Taco (opened September 2021 and the former home to Runway Seven, a women's clothing store, which closed sometime in 2019 after about two years...it looks like the other stores have since closed as well), Tiff's Treats, and Cava (opened 2023 to replace the original 2017 Zoë's Kitchen, which was phased out as a chain).

1027 and 1037 University Drive - Directly behind the 1025/1099 building is 1027 and 1037, a two-story building that wraps around the parking garage. This is where Star Cinema Grill is, located on the second level with the 1037 address. The 1027 addresses face University Drive while 1037 faces Century Court. Working from the farthest corner on the map, there's empty space, Grass Stains, a specialty boutique with its only location here (the original location in Graham, Texas has since closed), College Station's own Lululemon Athletica (with its pricey, brand-name yoga pants), Harvest Coffee (opened 2018 after its original 2014 Downtown Bryan location), a vacancy (it was second local location of I Heart Mac and Cheese, opened September 2020 but closed in early 2022), and finally, Brazos Running Company, opened around 2023 and moved from Central Station.

166 Century Court - Directly east of the preceding building, 166 Century Court is a multi-story office building ("Century Square Two") with six retail tenants currently on the ground floor. Luchesse Bootmaker (opened early 2021), a vacancy (temporarily home to "selfie museum" Instaland BCS), King Ranch Saddle Shop (opened late 2020), Apricot Lane (opened early 2022), Onward Reserve (opened November 2019), Kendra Scott (opened early 2022), and Hemline, a women's clothing boutique out of New Orleans.

144 Century Court - To the east of the preceding building. Hopdoddy Burger Bar, Hey Sugar, and Ring Guards by Montelongo's, are all located here. Ring Guards opened to replace Sabi Boutique. Sabi Boutique had maintained at storefront at The Lofts at Wolf Pen Creek for years (even when they couldn't hold onto any other retailers) and opened a new location at Century Square in April 2019. However, within a few months of opening at Century Square they opened a University Drive East location a few months later. By May 2020 Sabi had decided to close the Century Square location. The other two places, Hopdoddy and Hey Sugar I've never bought anything from, and I have some less-than-flattering impressions that I could tell you about, but it would be bad form to disparage open businesses.

143 Century Court - The "mirror" of the preceding building to the east, on the other side of The Green (an open space for outdoor events and al fresco dining) has three more tenant spaces: Blaze Pizza, Lick Honest Ice Creams (opened in October 2022 to replace Sub Zero Nitrogen Ice Cream, which closed in or around February 2020), and Sweet Paris Crêperie & Café. I've never been to Sweet Paris but I do know of it since it had replaced the Rice Village location of Texadelphia (a fact mentioned in our Texadelphia post).

175 Century Square Drive - The only retail tenant below the Century Square One office building is Galleria Spa Salon, formerly Galleria Day Spa (for years it used to be at the corner of Cavitt Drive and Villa Maria Drive, until it moved to Rock Prairie, which is still there). The office tenants include Breakaway Ministries, UBS Financial Services, and BRW Architects (among others).

Going counterclockwise around toward the back are two boutique hotels, "The George" (with "1791 Whiskey Bar" inside), which opened August 2017, and Cavalry Court, which opened November 2016 (one of the first tenants) with its "The Canteen" restaurant. Despite being a four-star hotel with off-season prices being around $120 a night (as of 2021), all the rooms open to the outside.

Directly behind The Green was Poppy (named after the late Bush 41's nickname). Sometime right around very early 2020 before you-know-what happened, Poppy closed for an upscale Mexican concept, opening in May 2022 as Juanita's Tex Mex Cantina (it was delayed, but it happened). West of Juanita's is Porters Dining + Butcher, a high-end (well, at least for College Station) steakhouse.

170 Century Square Drive - Finally, to the east of the complex is 100 Park, an apartment building that fits into the whole modern "mixed-use" concept, though not oriented toward students. At the bottom of this apartments include Pokéworks (opened January 2020) and MESS Waffles, which opened October 2018. This used to be known as Wafology, which was mentioned at the 711 University Drive article.

1289 University Drive - The first tenant to come...and go...Neighbors Emergency Center opened in October 2016 but closed around August 2016. This opened in October 2016 as Neighbors Emergency Center, a private 24-hour care emergency clinic that was the first open tenant in the Century Square development. However, it closed within about 10 months. In November 2018, CapRock Urgent Care opened in its place, and in spring 2021, became Integrity Urgent Care as CapRock sold off most of its facilities.

UPDATE 01-04-2021: After adding Century Square in the fourth edit version to this page in February 2020, the fifth edit to this page includes some tenant changes and other minor fixes.
UPDATE 07-10-2021: Minor updates, but the only thing of note was Integrity Urgent Care (CapRock sold).
UPDATE 12-13-2021: Added Velvet Taco and minor update regarding Poppy, as well as UBS.
UPDATE 04-23-2024: 2024 update for all stores and services at Century Square. Every paragraph was gone through and retouched. Cava, Apricot Lane, Brazos Running Company, Juanita's, and more were all added.