The meatpacking Dis trict keeps on attracting retailers, and now the block between The Standard and the Gansevoort hotels is starting to fill in.
All Saints just signed a large retail deal at 411-417 W. 13th St. with Thor Equities — which also just bought the retail space in the five-story condominium.
All Saints will occupy a 12,000-square-foot duplex divided equally between the ground and lower levels. The restaurant Bagatelle is right next door.
We also hear that Paul McAdam, the chief executive of All Saints North America, handled the deal personally.
Calls to the company, whose formal name is All Saints Spitalfields, were not returned by press time.
Joe Sitt‘s Thor Equities already has a relationship with the retailer after leasing both its 21,000-square-foot store at 512 Broadway in SoHo this year and on Lincoln Road in South Beach. Sitt was on a plane and unavailable.
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The Plaza’s residential management firm, Cooper Square Realty, is moving to 66,000 square feet at 622 Third Ave. for at least the next 11 years. The firm will have the 14th and 15th floors of the 39-story tower that sits between E. 40th and 41st streets.
The deal brings the 1 million-square-foot building within 13,000 feet of being 100-percent occupied. The asking rent was in the mid-$50s a foot.
Cooper Square will be moving from 6 E. 43rd St. next spring.
Mark Jaccom and Mark Friedman of Colliers International represented Cooper Square in its search. A Cushman & Wakefield team of Bruce Mosler, Arthur Mirante and Joseph Cabrera represented the Cohen Bros. building, along with David Nevins in-house.
The C&W-plus-Nevins team also just completed the Meredith deal for 212,594 square feet at 805 Third Ave., which we previously reported was in the works.
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The only signed office tenant at 510 Madison Ave. is still trying to retrade or get out of its lease. Sources say investment firm Jay Goldman & Co. hired Studley’s Ken Ruderman to “explore options.”
But we hear when they tried to powwow with new building owner, Boston Properties, to rework the 19th-floor deal, Boston Properties blew them off, saying they’d already paid a brokerage commission on the first go-around and that a deal — albeit a top of market deal — was still a deal.
According to state court litigation between Goldman and prior building owner Macklowe Properties, the space had been delivered to Goldman in December 2008, prior to the February 2009 fire at the newly constructed tower.
This set back its opening date by well over a year and contributed to the financial squeeze play that led to developer Harry Macklowe selling it to Boston Properties earlier this year.
It also led to a court battle between Macklowe and Goldman over whether Goldman defaulted on its lease or was locked out of the tower after the fire.
Meanwhile, Goldman is sitting pretty in a month-to-month sublease of a portion of its prior offices at Carnegie Hall Tower. The firm’s attorney declined comment.
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Now that Jet Blue is flying into a new Queens office, its current 200,000-square-foot digs at Forest Hills Tower, owned by Muss Development, will be marketed by a Jones Lang LaSalle team.
JLL area President Peter Riguardi, along with Kenneth Siegel, William Korchak and Howard Hersch from the city office, will coordinate with Raymond Ruiz from JLL’s Long Island office.
The space in the 16-story, 350,000-square- foot building at 118-35 Queens Blvd. will be available in late 2012. The asking rent in the mid-$30s a foot will be reduced further due to the as-of- right city relocation and employee assistance program — REAP-plus an occupancy tax exemption, lower real estate taxes and low-cost power.
“It’s the largest block of first-class space left in Queens,” said Jason Muss. “It’s a building within a building with its own separate entrance, separate lobby, elevator bank, systems and even its own parking garage.”
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Another Jones Lang LaSalle team represented CBS Broadcasting in a deal with the law firm Dorsey & Whitney at 51 W. 52nd St., fondly known as Black Rock for its granite color. The law firm will occupy the 8th through 10th floors, totaling 70,476 feet, under a 15-year lease that had a starting asking rent of $60 a foot. The firm will relocate from 250 Park Ave.
The attorneys were represented by John Cefaly, Gus Field and Donald Preate of Cushman & Wakefield, while CBS was repped by the JLL team of Peter Riguardi, Frank Doyle, Barbara Winter and Andrew Flint.
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A long block away, the law firm Schiff Hardin leased the full 16th and 17th floors, totaling 48,164 square feet, at 666 Fifth Ave. for the next 10 years.
The 1.5 million-square-foot 41-story office building on the west side of the avenue between 52nd and 53rd streets is owned by the Kushner Companies.
Schiff Hardin, which was founded in 1864, will relocate from 900 Third Ave. in early 2011. Scott Gottlieb and Michael Wellen of CB Richard Ellis represented the law firm, while CBRE colleagues Howard Fiddle, Zachary Freeman and Stephen Siegel represented the building owner.
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Of course, Kushner’s 666 Fifth is the current destination retailing home of the NBA store, which has hunky bronze forearms as its door pulls. The league has agreed to vacate by the end of February and, as we’ve told you, is currently on a hunt for space.
The NBA “cube” is actually 35,000 square feet but because of the large central circular stairway, its selling space is only 16,000 feet. Sources said Paul Berkman of Newmark Knight Frank is leading the league on a Midtown tourist-haunt hunt for up to 20,000 square feet. We also hear they will be dribbling around town again tomorrow.
“We continue to take them around and are optimistic we will be able to satisfy their requirement,” Berkman said.
One of the reasons it isleaving 666 Fifth is that the current rents in the area would be five to six times its current rent of around $20 million a year. That’s a lot of basketballs and jerseys.
“We need the right fit and the right location and thrown into the mix is a possible time lag between the opening of the new store and the closing of the current one,” said our source.
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As expected, a 49-percent non-controlling, non-operating stake in the office portion of 1540 Broadway was sold to HSBC Alternative Investments Ltd. and Edge Fund Advisors on behalf of banking clients. The sale recapitalizes the building at $520 million, or $575 a foot. We first reported the winner on Sept. 22 at a slightly higher pricing.
Darcy Stacom and William Shanahan of CB Richard Ellis marketed the deal for their client, CB Richard Ellis Strategic Partners.
lois@betweenthebricks.com