Tim Love’s River Shack, err, Woodshed – New Trinity River / Trinity Trails-Oriented Development at Riverfront & Rogers Road
June 9, 2011 at 9:59 am | Architecture & Urban Design, Urban Development | Tags: Architecture, Food & Drink, Retail, Shop Local, Trinity River Vision, urban design
EDIT – Per a tweet from Mr. Love himself, the project formerly identified as the “River Shack” will actually be called “The Woodshed”. This post has been updated to reflect the corrected name. Thanks for the info, Chef Love!
One of the aspects of the Trinity River Vision has been a series of improvements to the Trinity Trails, trailheads, and their surroundings. While the Trinity Uptown district and the Gateway Park plans get the most press, these trail improvements have been ongoing and very welcome. The latest project to spring from the TRV and its partnerships is taking shape at the Waggoner Trailhead on Riverfront between University and Rogers Road.
The Waggoner Trailhead in general is getting some hefty upgrades, including new bike parking, water fountains, trail map station, restrooms, and a misting station to cool off users of the trail during the warmer months. More mysterious has been the new building going up at the trailhead – and it’s going to be a pretty innovative and cool development.
This new structure is the latest restaurant project from celebrity chef Tim Love. To be named “The Woodshed”, the project has been called by Love a “global taqueria”, and is projected to open in “the fall”, though no firm date has been announced (the building looks pretty far along already). Thanks to our friends at the TRV, we headed down the trail with camera in hand and took a walk through the project.
The Woodshed is something of a new concept for Fort Worth: development that doesn’t treat the Trinity River and the trails as an afterthought. The building’s focus is heavily on the river and trails. It’s a U-shaped structure with the open end facing the Trinity. It’s got minimal parking for cars (head-in street parking on Riverfront and a small lot on Rogers), and indeed from the street does have something of a “shack” feel to it at times, albeit an extremely clean and modern-looking one. Materials are simple: corrugated metal and light wood. Approach from the Trinity Trails, though, and the view is considerably different.
The building’s open U shape wraps around a gravel courtyard, which will serve as outdoor dining space (which is the majority of the space). This courtyard leads directly up to the upper trail path, meaning people can walk or bike right up. An indoor (though, from what we could see, still primarily open-air-focused) dining area occupies the western part of the U, enclosed in large glass roll-up doors with a patio featuring what appear to be small bars for standing & dining looking out over the courtyard. The “bottom” of the U appears to be kitchen & restroom space (plus a partially enclosed, open-air space whose function wasn’t totally apparent but may be some kind of play area for kids, going by some TRV concept drawings we found). The eastern end of the U is an open area that appears to be intended as a live music stage.
The entire complex is just down from the trailhead, and features fantastic views over the trails & river, the new fishing pier, the University bridge, and the Forest Park Apartments tower in the distance.
Even in this unfinished state, the Woodshed is interesting. The design looks to be going for a real seamless feel between the river, trails, outdoor dining, and indoor dining (something Love’s other “Shack” eateries, the Love Shack, also tend to incorporate). One can imagine the space, filled with covered tables, people moving about, and bikes parked, with live music on the stage, being quite festive. (And yes, there will be bike parking provided.)
The building’s design is quite modern and clean, with a hint of the “rustic shack” thing in the forms of the structure. Those big glass roll-up doors will make a popular feature on evenings as the river surroundings are bathed in sunset color.
The building’s situated just across the street from the large Gallery 1701 and Colonial Park apartment infill buildings, making those developments instantly more walkable and “neighborhood” feeling with a dining spot just across the street.
Next door are the ongoing Waggoner Trailhead improvements, designed in a matching style. The pole on the left is the misting station.
The Woodshed seems really interesting from a design and conceptual standpoint. It’s a good sign that people are starting to treat the Trinity and its trails as something to embrace with projects like this. And, of course, with Tim Love at the helm, the food promises to be interesting as well. We can’t imagine this being anything less than a smash hit, and can especially see large group bike rides ending up here in the evenings.
As we mentioned, the only info on the Woodshed’s opening is “fall”, so we’ll keep our ears open for more details. In the meantime, here’s a gallery of images taken during our walkthrough of the building – click a thumbnail to embiggen:
