Retro redevelopment

Former ‘hostess college’ for flight attendants lands on the market in Dallas

The five-story building dates back to 1968.

Photo courtesy of Marcus and Millichap

Oh, if these walls could talk. The former Braniff Hostess College — a training center and dorm for Braniff International flight attendants — has flown onto the market.

The five-story building, which dates back to 1968, encompasses 59,925 square feet on nearly 1 acre at 2801 Wycliff Ave., next to the Dallas North Tollway and near Dallas Love Field. Most recently, the property was a retirement community called ParkGate, which opened in 1999 and closed in 2014. It’s been vacant since then.

While the building originated as the Braniff Hostess College, it hosted flight attendants for just six years. It subsequently housed accounting operations and a drug treatment center.

Braniff, which took off in 1928, moved its headquarters to Dallas in 1942. At one time, it was the world’s sixth largest airline. Braniff shut down in 1982.

Pierce Lacey and Associates designed the Braniff Hostess College, where countless numbers of women underwent training to be a Braniff “hostess.”

“A sunken common area with a round ‘floating’ fireplace was known as the ‘Passion Pit’ since the women could mingle with male guests there,” according to the Dallas chapter of the American Institute of Architects.

A 1971 article for the magazine published by the Ninety-Nines, an organization of women pilots, recounted a tour of the Braniff Hostess College by members of the group’s Golden Triangle chapter.

“They have lovely, modern facilities,” a Ninety-Nines correspondent wrote. “Sure would like to attend their makeup and hair-styling classes. Do you suppose they could make us all look like those lovely young girls?”

In 2014, the Braniff Foundation nominated the Braniff Hostess College for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. However, the property hasn’t made the list. According to a 2002 rezoning application, the building represents a “significant time” in the architectural, cultural, and business history of Dallas.

Matthew Sheard and Joe Santelli, both of the Dallas office of commercial real estate services company Marcus & Millichap, are marketing the former Braniff property as a redevelopment opportunity. Sheard and Santelli aren’t publicizing a sale price.

“This property is an incredibly rare tollway redevelopment opportunity and has very strong fundamentals for [an] infill asset,” Sheard says in a statement.

The building has been gutted to make way for new uses, such as offices, condos, or hotel rooms. On top of that, the property is able to support a 10-story expansion, meaning the building could go as high as 15 stories.

“A new investor can add their mark to this famous building or start their own legacy," Sheard says. "Either way, they have tremendous opportunities.”

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Million-dollar homes

Multi-million-dollar gated home community The Preserve rises in Frisco

Preserve

A palace on the prairie of The Preserve in Frisco

Construction has begun on a multi-million-dollar custom home community in Frisco. Called The Preserve, it's situated among PGA Frisco’s championship golf courses and near the Omni PGA Frisco Resort, with multiple phases that will roll out over the next few years.

The Preserve is part of Fields, a 2,500-acre development in North Frisco off the Dallas North Tollway. Fields is co-developed and owned in partnership with The Karahan Companies, Hunt Realty Investments alongside investors Chief Partners and Cross Tie Capital.

The development will feature retail, dining, entertainment, hotels, corporate offices, native Texas plants, flowers, trees, and 250 acres of park space. It's designed by the same team responsible for Plano’s Legacy West, led by Fehmi Karahan.

Phase 1 of The Preserve will feature 233 homes crafted by 10 North Texas luxury homebuilders: Alford Homes, Coats Homes, and Starside Builders have all begun home construction. The other seven are The Preserve Bella Custom Homes, Endurance Homes, Faulkner Perrin Custom Homes, Hawkins-Welwood Homes, Shaddock Custom Builders & Developers, Sharif & Munir Custom Homes, and Ventura Custom Homes, for whom construction will start soon.

The Preserve Frisco The Preserve in Frisco, soon to be covered with homes.The Preserve

Lot sizes range from 6,800 square feet to more than an acre. Home design options will incorporate high ceilings, open floor plans, glass walls, and seamless transitions between indoor and outdoor such as patios, infinity pools, and landscaped exteriors.

The surrounding area will have more than 2,000 new trees plus views delivered via design elements such as floor-to-ceiling windows and expansive outdoor living areas.

Many of the homes will address sustainability, health, and wellness with green architecture, energy efficiency, water conservation, and recycled building materials.

It will combine the privacy of a gated community with resort-style living, featuring amenities such as the PGA golf courses, 20+ miles of hike and bike trails, and the exclusive Brookside Club with an expansive swimming pool, state-of-the-art fitness center, tennis and pickleball courts and a playground.

Prices will start at $3,500,000.

Hunt Realty SVP Todd Watson calls it one of the most anticipated mixed-use projects in the area -- æa perfect location for discerning buyers seeking their forever home or a secondary residence" — although he's involved with the project so he's probably biased.

“As part of the Fields development, with prominent neighbors like PGA of America and the Omni PGA Frisco Resort, we know The Preserve will be one of the most sought-after addresses in North Texas," Watson says.

According to the Frisco Economic Development Corporation, Frisco’s population has increased by 500 percent in two decades and was recently recognized as the fastest growing city in Texas and third across the U.S.

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