Post Oak Boulevard has carried nearly a thousand new live oaks, dedicated bus lanes and wider sidewalks for a while now, the finished result of a $192 million streetscape project that turned the stretch between Westheimer Road and San Felipe Street into something closer to a boulevard than a frontage road. What was missing until this fall was a reason to actually use it. The buildings on either side of that finished street are only now catching up to the sidewalk in front of them.
Two projects, both landing within the same six months, are why. Central Park Post Oak, the reimagined version of the old Post Oak Central office campus, is on track to finish in fall 2026. A few blocks south, Eataly's Houston debut is wrapping construction at The Centre at Post Oak on that same timeline. For the first time since the boulevard itself got rebuilt, the buildings around it are finishing at the same pace as the street.
The Street Finished First
Midway broke ground on Central Park Post Oak in April 2025, well after the boulevard's public right of way had already been rebuilt with new lighting, wider walks and repositioned live oak trees. The order matters. The corridor got its sidewalks and its trees before anyone had signed a lease on what would actually face them, a bet that walkability alone would eventually pull retail investment behind it.
That bet is now landing on a fixed calendar. Central Park Post Oak's 17 acres between Westheimer and San Felipe sat for decades as a corporate campus wrapped around a lawn. The redevelopment plan calls for more than 150,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space, including a jewel box restaurant planned for the corner of Ambassador Way, replacing that lawn with two new retail buildings and a repositioned stand of the property's heritage oaks.
What's Already Open This Season
Not everything waited for construction to wrap. Wagyu House opened May 1 in the former Peli Peli space, an all-you-can-eat Japanese barbecue concept from Chubby Group with four pricing tiers that run from domestic cuts to A5 Japanese wagyu. It moved into an existing footprint, no new construction required, and it's open today inside a plaza that's about to see two much larger builds finish around it.
The two projects still ahead are a different kind of change: new construction, both tied to the same fall 2026 deadline.
The Two Blocks Still Filling In
Eataly's Houston location is going into a 20,050-square-foot space at 5000 Westheimer, inside The Centre at Post Oak, a strip that once held an Ethan Allen furniture store. The build-out is priced at $11.5 million, designed by the local office of Gensler, with construction that started in January 2026 and is slated to wrap by September. The plaza already holds Morton's The Steakhouse and Moxie's Grill and Bar, both a short walk from where Eataly's market and cooking classrooms are set to open.
Central Park Post Oak's restaurant lineup reads like a hospitality roster assembled from four different cities. The Henry, part of Fox Restaurant Concepts, is taking a 7,000-square-foot jewel box space along Post Oak Boulevard for a menu that runs breakfast through dinner. Handies Douzo, a hand roll concept already running locations in the Heights, Montrose and Spring Branch, is opening its fourth here. Buck & Rider brings an Arizona-based oyster bar and brunch program north into Uptown, and Sparrow Italia arrives as an Italian steakhouse from the group behind Toca Madera.
Clayton Freels, executive vice president at Midway, described the intent behind the redevelopment directly: "We are crafting a lifestyle for those who work, shop, and dine here."
What Changes for an Actual Fall Evening
Until this year, walking the boulevard meant passing construction fencing as often as storefronts. That's the part changing now. A resident parking once near The Galleria can already stop at Wagyu House, then continue up Post Oak Boulevard past the finished sidewalks and live oaks toward Central Park Post Oak's restaurant row, no car required between stops. Once Eataly opens a few blocks over at The Centre at Post Oak, that same walk extends further still.
For years this corridor worked as two separate trips: one to the mall, another to wherever dinner happened afterward, each requiring its own parking spot. This fall is the first season where those two trips fold into a single walk.
The LaRose Kaileh Group keeps a close watch on how corridors like Post Oak Boulevard change block by block, not just deal by deal. If you're curious what a specific stretch of Uptown looks like on the ground right now, Request a Private Consultation and we'll walk you through it.
