Please note that advance ticket purchase is required for this walking tour. Scroll down or click here to register.
After Rice Institute and Hermann Park opened in the early 1910s, Houston's South End became an increasingly desirable neighborhood in which to live and work — and it remains one today.
This 90-minute, docent-guided walking tour explores the beautiful area between Main Street and Montrose Boulevard just north of the park, including the buildings of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the charming neighborhoods of Chelsea Place, Cotswold Court and Colby Court; and the imposing churches of Main Street. Along the way, we'll see work from architects William Ward Watkin, Joseph Finger, MacKie & Kamrath and Carlos Jiménez as well as the newest additions to the MFAH campus, Steven Holl’s Glassell School of Art and Nancy and Rich Kinder Building.
This is an exterior architecture tour only. The tour will not go inside any buildings. There are no public restrooms along the tour route.
About the tour
Admission is $10 per person for the general public ($7 for Preservation Houston members and students.) Children 11 years old and under are admitted free.
Advance ticket purchase is required. Reservations are offered on a first-come, first-served basis. We are not able to accommodate walk-ups the day of the tour. There are no refunds for tour reservations.
Registrants will receive parking and check-in information via e-mail.
Face masks are optional for all fully vaccinated individuals, including docents. We require that tourgoers who are not fully vaccinated remain masked at all times during the tour, including at check in. This policy may change based on recommendations from the CDC and local health officials.
In the event of inclement weather that prevents the tour from being offered as planned, we will notify registrants as far in advance as possible about their options to attend a rescheduled tour or transfer their reservations to another Preservation Houston tour.
Reserve your tickets now
Do you have an Architecture Walks pass?
If you have joined Preservation Houston and received a pass for a free Architecture Walk since February 2020, you may redeem the pass for admission to this tour. E-mail us and we'll be happy to help.
Passes are redeemable subject to ticket availability.