Does anyone know some of the streets in the artists comminity of "Itchy Acres" in Houston.?

Question

I'm an artist, I'd like to see the community, and possibly think of moving there.

Answer 1

Donovan Street in 77091

Here's some more info from a past Chronicle story

Nov. 12--Painter Pat Colville was working in a Brooklyn loft, but two years ago, when looking for a place to live part of the year, she bought a 2-acre farm in northwest Houston, on the edge of Acres Homes. There's a chicken coop on the property and a horse her son tends.

She expected to be the only artist in the neighborhood. But she was wrong. She had, in fact, landed in Houston's newest art enclave.

In Houston, artists do what artists everywhere have done for centuries: revitalize neglected areas by revamping cheap old buildings and warehouses to use as housing and studio space.

But rising property values have begun to drive them from close-in neighborhoods. Now, they're building brand-new metal houses and studios outside the Loop.

That movement is most visible north of Loop 610 and west of Interstate 45 in wooded, historically black neighborhoods such as Acres Homes and Independence Heights.

Some of Houston's best-known artists either already live and work there or have bought property with plans to build. The roster includes The Art Guys, Paul Kittelson, Carter Ernst, Virgil Grotfeldt, Terrell James, Lee Littlefield, Ed Wilson and Tim Glover.

Like many of them, Colville plans to erect a metal building on her property and has hired architect Cameron Armstrong, a pioneer in Houston's "tin house" movement.

"It's a little rough, a little edgy," she says of the area, "but I love it."

'Itchy Acres' The migration of artists to northwest Houston dates to 1989, when Kittelson and Ernst, a married pair of Houston sculptors living in the gentrifying Heights, saw opportunity in Independence Heights. They bought an overgrown 7/8 of an acre on Martin.

Because the lot was covered in poison ivy, they christened their new empire "Itchy Acres."

"It was definitely different," Kittelson said. The house on the property was built in the 1940s and hadn't been touched in decades. The whole neighborhood, near the semi-rural Acres Home subdivision, had started declining in the 1970s.

But other than the poison ivy, which Kittelson attacked with a machete, the couple thought the place was ideal: The land was cheap, and it was big enough for both of them to build their own studios.

Seventeen years and a lot of Benadryl later, Itchy Acres is a 4-acre compound of studios, workshops and houses populated by a quartet of artists, a family of four and seven dogs.

Answer 2

I've lived in Houston for 30 years and never heard of it. My wife is an artist and hasn't heard of it either.

EDIT: I just did a little research, and it seems that some Houston artists have recently been buying property up in the Acres Homes and Independence Heights areas and building houses. These are the neighborhoods west of I-45 and just north of 610 and they are, to say the least, pretty rough. I'd think twice about living there.