The Grapevine Main: A New Building So Weird You Have to See It

Dallas Morning News architecture critic Mark Lamster says that Grapevine Main, inspired by a long-demolished train station, is an architectural oddball.

By Mark Lamster - Dallas Morning News • Published July 28, 2021 • Updated on July 28, 2021 at 4:18 pm

A few weeks ago, when I posted an image of the building known as Grapevine Main on my Instagram feed, the replies were, well, a lot: quizzical comments, derisive comments, approving comments, emojis of all kinds.

What exactly is Grapevine Main? I’m not sure how to answer that question, but I can tell you this: It is quite easily the weirdest new building in North Texas, a $105 million train station that’s not a train station, with a historicist design that is unlike any other building, anywhere. So, yes, it is an oddity.

But you don’t have to take my word for it. “It’s a crazy project,” says John Allender, who led the design of the building for Dallas-based Architexas. “It’s bizarre. There’s nothing else like it.”