Hooper’s

Hooper’s is a restaurant in Kingsland, Texas, housed inside one of the most important surviving locations from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). The early-20th-century Queen Anne farmhouse was used as the home of Leatherface and his cannibalistic family and appears extensively throughout Tobe Hooper’s film. Many of its best-known scenes were filmed inside and around the building, including Leatherface’s attacks on the group, Sally Hardesty’s captivity and the notorious dinner sequence involving the Sawyer family.

At the time of filming in the summer of 1973, the house stood on Quick Hill Road near Round Rock, north of Austin. The surrounding area was then largely rural, allowing the filmmakers to present the farmhouse as an isolated property far from help. The production used both the exterior and interior of the actual house rather than constructing a studio set. Parts of the building were dressed with animal remains, bones and other material to create the Sawyer family home seen in the film.

Development around Round Rock eventually threatened the property, and in 1998 the house was purchased and removed from its original location. It was divided into several large sections, transported approximately 60 miles west to Kingsland and reconstructed on the grounds of The Antlers Inn. The building was extensively restored while retaining its distinctive exterior features, including the wraparound porch, decorative woodwork and unusual roofline visible in the film.

After its relocation, the house was used as a restaurant under several names. It operated for a period as the Junction House before becoming Grand Central Cafe in 2012. New owners acquired the property in 2022 and renamed the restaurant Hooper’s in honour of director Tobe Hooper. The renovated restaurant officially opened under the new name in January 2023 and serves Southern-influenced American food, breakfast, brunch, dinner and cocktails.

The current owners openly acknowledge the building’s horror-film history. Photographs, props, memorabilia and references to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre are displayed throughout the property, and visitors are permitted to explore parts of the building outside the main dining areas. Several architectural features seen in the film remain recognisable, including the entrance hall, staircase, porch and the room used for the Sawyer family dinner sequence. An upstairs area also contains displays and photo opportunities related to the film.

Hooper’s is named after Tobe Hooper rather than the fictional family and functions primarily as a restaurant, but the preservation of the original building makes it one of the principal surviving locations connected to the 1974 film. Along with the former Last Chance Gas Station near Bastrop and Bagdad Cemetery in Leander, it forms part of the group of original Central Texas locations still visited by fans of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.