San Antonio to Receive Architectural Makeover

City Design Center is in charge of crafting architecture designs for downtown San Antonio, foretelling the city's plans to improve architecture and developments, reported My San Antonio blog.

"We're trying to protect downtown's sense of authenticity, which means using local materials, local forms and shapes, things that are uniquely San Antonio," said City Design Center's director Mark Brodeur. "As we see new developments being built recently, those buildings could have been built and dropped in any community in Texas. We want to recapture developing buildings that have a sense of San Antonio's authenticity."

San Antonio has several landmarks including the Tower Life Building that's to be at the epicenter of crafting a blueprint. 

"The new architecture has to be inspired by the old architecture," Brodeur said.

The City Design Center, a development within the city that focuses on urban design in the private and public sector, states on their homepage the urban design will make San Antonio a great place for social and economic purposes and attractive to visit and live.

City Design Center is expected to join a panel of architects, developers and city planners to review trends and go over challenges in the urban design project on Wednesday, at Trinity University Holt Center.  

Panelists will include the Trinity University Press, imagineSanAntonio, NOWCastSA and Plaza de Armas. The forum is expected to strike a conversation between supporters and the public. 

The draw-up of the plan is expected to be released to the public in April or May, according to San Antonio Blog. In the fall, the city adopted several new standards for historical buildings that include development on private property; the materials used at what consistency and the street and sidewalk guidelines. The revamped designs intend to complement the old and the new.