-By AnnMarie Marano, Photography by Eric Laignel

As a kid, who didn't daydream about that tricked out tree house your parents were going to build you (someday)? Nestled within the Discovery Green Conservancy's 12-acre park in downtown Houston lies a much more sophisticated, adult version of that tree house. The Grove Restaurant—Schiller Del Grande Restaurant Group's first green project—blends with the other small buildings in the park as well as its surrounding oak trees with ease. This eatery gives park-goers and diners alike an interactive experience with their natural surroundings.

"The Conservancy wanted a restaurant that would create activity and use of the park," says Larry Speck, FAIA, lead designer on the project and principal with architecture firm PageSoutherlandPage in Houston. "They wanted it to energize the area around it and to be able to serve outdoor events. So that indoor/outdoor relationship was very important."

But the design team needed to pay homage to the environment and incredible downtown views surrounding the building, while also creating an excitement and appeal for the restaurant that was all its own. "How do you compete with the park?" asks Candice Schiller, the restaurant's interior designer and co-founder of Schiller Del Grande Restaurant Group, the Grove's operator. "How does the indoor compete with those surroundings?"

The designers decided the answer lay with an open kitchen. Two grill lines that run parallel to the dining room, a staging area, and a rotisserie are all in full view. "We tried to make the kitchen interesting so the restaurant wouldn't be off balance. It creates that balance of activity on the inside and the outside," Schiller explains. Also adding to the scene is a glowing, island bar (which allows for 360 degrees of activity), as well as bright, specially commissioned pieces of art by Mexican artist Eduardo Ortiz. Artist Margo Sawyer created the multicolored installations that grace the park as well as the exterior of the building.

Discovery Green Park as a whole is tracking LEED Gold certification, and The Grove contributes to that effort. Everything from menu to materials is sustainably driven. PageSoutherlandPage utilized FSC-certified woods, Gulf Coast soft brick, and photovoltaic panels on the roof. Grove chefs take advantage of the roof-top herb garden, which grows ingredients for use in the restaurant.

"They wanted a lot of glass," Speck says. "The building's orientation is ideal. The long face is north to south. There's indirect light from the north, so the glass can face north and you don't have to worry." And as a freestanding building with three sides of glass, the restaurant posed a challenge in that it had virtually no backside. "We had to make a back door court for deliveries and dumpsters," which he says is invisible to diners.

"The short face is east to west. The downward-sloping roof offers a good overhang on the south. We needed to have those Southeast breezes for the upper level," says Speck.

While the restaurant sits on the ground floor, the upper level houses a second, mostly outdoor bar, aptly named the Tree House. "The oaks surrounding the deck on the second floor still have about 12 to 15 ft. of height above you. So it feels like you are in the trees," explains Schiller. There is also a private dining room upstairs to satisfy the area's high demand.

Schiller chose the So Happy chair by Marco Maran for Max Design of Italy for the decks, using a red for the lower decks to represent flowers, and white upstairs to mimic clouds sitting amongst the tree tops. "Frequently, a restaurant is designed to take a person into another world. The challenge is always to leave the world behind, but the opposite was the situation with the park," says Schiller. "We didn't want to create an environment that contrasted the park. We wanted continuity, both inside and out."


who
Project: The Grove at Discovery Green. Client: Discovery Green Conservancy. Architect, mechanical engineer, electrical engineer: PageSoutherlandPage. Interior designer: Schiller Del Grande Restaurant Group; Candice Schiller. Structural engineer: Henderson and Rogers. General contractor: Miner-Dederick Construction. Lighting designer: Bos Lighting Design; Photographer: Eric Laignel.

what
Paint: Sherwin Williams. Masonry: St. Joe. Ceiling: 9 Wood, Armstrong. Lighting fixtures: custom lamps by Lighting Unlimited. Doors: Ceco. Door Hardware: Best, Dorma, Hager. Window treatments: MechoShade. Chairs: Design Within Reach, Max Design, Janus et Cie, Philippe Starck, Crate & Barrel. Dining tables: Eagle Chair, Joshtom Millwork. Upholstery: Place Textiles, Artisan Upholstery. Bar top and face: 3-form. Artwork: original oil on canvas by Eduardo Ortiz.

where
Location: Houston. Total floor area: 17, 180 sq. ft. No. of floors: two. Total capacity by tables or guests: 56 bar seats, 230 interior dining seats, 176 2nd-floor outdoor patio seats, 80 outdoor covered banquet seats.