Farewell, old Houston Chronicle building. You will not be...

A year ago, the Houston Chronicle relocated from its old downtown location to old/new digs in the Houston Post Building at the Southwest Freeway and 610.

I think the new digs are quite nice. But old-guard newspaper folks can be slow to change. So many of my colleagues miss the old joint. Not me. Admittedly, my tenure at the old Chron building was short compared with some. I spent only about a dozen years there.

But the sentimentality always confused me, because the place was an architectural travesty, with multiple buildings fused together into a frankenstructure.

It was also a dump. Not a well-seasoned "if these walls could talk" dump. More a spackle-and-duct-tape dump. One with plumbing issues. Which is to say a moist dump.

For the past year, I've worked here.

But old 801 Texas is a dump no more. As of April 5, it's a pile of rubble.

So maybe it is still a dump, but one that will soon be cleared away making room for something newer, taller, fancier.

That said, even dumps have their charms.

The photo gallery above and video clip are my visual essay in appreciation of the lost interior of a miserable old place that might've benefited from destruction long before it actually disappeared.

Bookmark Gray Matters. Even dumps have their charms.

