A planned 22-unit loft apartment building at 930 Samuels Ave. near downtown Fort Worth is moving toward final design plans.
The developer, LFP Properties Inc. of North Richland Hills, has been negotiating design details with city staff and the Fort Worth Downtown Design Review Board and is expected to make a final presentation at the board’s meeting in August. LFP also is seeking a rezoning of the site, at Samuels Avenue and Greer Street. It made its latest presentation at the board’s June 5 meeting.
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“It’s a neighborhood that’s growing,” Michael Forbes, the general contractor, told the Report in an interview. “It has a younger crowd, a lot of walkability. It’s not too far from downtown.”
Elsewhere on the board’s agenda June 5, it also heard an update on the site plan for the Texas A&M University campus downtown.
Fort Worth Downtown Design Review Board
Thursday, June 5, 2025, Fort Worth City Hall
Members present: Paul Rietema, Kirk Millican, Leah Dunn, Matthijs Melchiors, Brandon Burns, Tony Pham, Mark Dabney
Call to order: Chair calls meeting to order.
Announcements: Board welcomed three new members: Kirk Millican, Brandon Burns and Mark Dabney. It also recognized outgoing member Laura Bird, who was appointed in 2018 and was chair for more than a year.
Election of officers: Kirk Millican nominated to be chair. Motion seconded. Motion passed unanimously. Tony Pham will continue as vice chair.
Approval of May 1, 2025, meeting minutes: Motion was made and seconded to approve. The motion passed unanimously.
Presentations:
- Texas A&M University’s new Research and Innovation Building downtown. Architect Michael Bennett noted that, although the university isn’t required to come before the DDRB, it chose to update the board on the design process of its downtown campus, which is under construction on a law school to start with. “We’re in the middle of the design process,” he said.
Randall Daniel, an architect with the SmithGroup, a project team member, presented several renderings showing the positioning of the buildings in context with Calhoun, Jones, 15th, 14th and 13th streets. The city is moving toward vacating 14th Street, which bisects the site, to give A&M a unified site to work with in creating what it said will be a highly pedestrian-friendly campus.
“We felt it was very important to address termination of 14th Street,” Daniel told the board. “We felt it was very important in terms of placemaking to really engage Calhoun Street. The intent here is to really create a sense of place here along Calhoun.”
- The Lofts at Samuels, 930 Samuels Ave., LFP Properties Inc.
LFP Properties is preparing for a final presentation to the DDRB in August of its plans for a 22-unit apartment building at Samuels Avenue and Greer Street, on the southeast corner of the intersection. It presented at the June 5 DDRB meeting to get feedback from the board.
The latest plans call for parking in the rear of the property, screened from both Samuels and Greer.
The plan “basically hides the parking from the street,” Michael Forbes, the project general contractor, told the board.
Forbes told the board he’s working on staff concerns about the elevation.
“The most important concern was the layout of the site,” he said. “That’s (why) we’re here today, was to try to get some feedback.”
LFP also plans to seek a rezoning of the site, currently zoned D, to D with a planned development. When it returns to the DDRB in August, Forbes told the board he expects a very detailed landscape plan.
New cases:
- DG25-010: 335 W. 3rd St. (H zoning), Downtown Urban District Overlay, Council District 9. Owner/applicant: Bobby Ham/Roger Chung, Legacy Signs of Texas.
Application: Request certificate of appropriateness to install an illuminated exterior ground floor wall sign for a new location of Hoya Korean Kitchen. Action: Motion made and seconded to approve, with staff-recommended changes. The staff had recommended a continuance so it could continue to work with the property owner. Motion passed 7-0. - DG25-013: 1102 Garvey St. (D zoning), Downtown Urban Design District overlay, Council District 9. Owner/applicant: Eduardo Aburto, JAK Homes LLC.
Application:
- Request certificate of appropriateness for an addition of more than 500 square feet to a single-family detached home.
- Request the following waivers from the Downtown Urban Design Standards and Guidelines:
a) Waiver from building height, massing, orientation and setback standards to allow building form (two-story home) that is consistent with those predominantly found on the block face (one-story home).
b) Waiver from the building height, massing, orientation and setback standards to allow a garage that is not behind a main structure.
c) Waiver from sidewalk standards to install a 5-foot-wide sidewalk instead of the requirement of a 7-foot one.
d) Waiver from street tree standards to not install one street tree for every 50 feet of property frontage due to the limited planting area.
Action: Motion made and seconded to approve the staff recommendation, but to remove the requirement for the sidewalk. Motion passed 5-2, with Dunn and Burns voting no.
c) DG25-015: 1112 and 1114 E. 1st St. (H zoning), Downtown Urban Design District overlay, Council District 9. Owner/applicant: Williams Tharp/Cielo Gonzalez, Mello Signs.
Application:
a) Request certificate of appropriateness to install an illuminated ground-floor wall sign and a non-illuminated ground-floor plaque sign.
b) Request the following waiver from the Downtown Urban Design Standards and Guidelines: waiver from the plaque signs standards to allow a sign with a height of 5’ 4”, instead of the maximum height of 2 feet, and a width of 3’ 2” instead of the maximum width of 2 feet.
Action: Motion made and seconded to approve subject to staff recommendation and comments made by the chair in regard to windows. Motion passed 5-2, with Rietema and Pham voting no.
d) DG25-016: 1501 and 1401 Calhoun St. (D zoning), Downtown Urban Design District overlay, Council District 9. Owner/applicant: Michael Bennett, Bennett Partners.
Application:
a) Request certificate of appropriateness for the installation of street trees, pedestrian lights, landscape elements and sidewalks as part of Phase 1 of the new Texas A&M University-Fort Worth Research and Innovation Building.
b) Request the following waiver from the Downtown Urban Design Standards and Guidelines: Pedestrian light standards to allow a maximum spacing of 80 feet between pedestrian lights, instead of the required minimum spacing of 80 feet, and a waiver from the street tree standards to allow a maximum spacing of 84 feet between street trees instead of the required maximum spacing of 25 feet.Action: Burns recused himself. Motion made and seconded to approve. Motion passed 6-0.
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