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Two of the world’s greatest commercial real estate dealmakers achieved different kinds of milestones this month. Cushman & Wakefield promoted its long-reigning superbroker Tara Stacom to executive vice-chairman of the firm. And CBRE regional CEO Mary Ann Tighe stepped down as chairman of the Real Estate Board of New York after serving an illustrious two-year term.
It would be easy to dub Stacom and Tighe — friendly competitors but competitors to a fault — the Great Ladies of Leasing. But it would trivialize their impact on the city’s commercial market and, especially in Tighe’s case, on the built environment.
Condé Nast’s impending move to the World Trade Center is surely the most momentous new lease of the young century, and it’s fitting that both brokers played indispensable roles in making it happen.
Stacom has been in the news recently as leasing agent for 1 WTC. Before that, she was involved in negotiating 40 million square feet of office leasing deals of all types for Cushman — all over town, even in The Bronx — in addition to serving as landlords’ agent for 10 million square feet more.
These days, Stacom is walking prospective tenants through 1 WTC’s remaining 1.4 million square feet.
But just a few years ago, she was walking journalists like me through muddy “Ground Zero” — then a treacherous landscape of exposed pits and loose planks — to show off the former Freedom Tower’s steel skeleton that had quietly poked about 15 stories above ground.
A colleague of mine, former Post Editorial Page Editor Bob McManus, and I wore hard hats and pretended to bark orders into cell phones like we were running the job. We were enthralled by the infant steel, a stirring breakthrough after seven years of struggle to get the project out of the ground.
At the time, 1 WTC was owned entirely by the Port Authority; the Durst Organization later became a partner. With Stacom at the leasing helm, the tower is now just over 50 percent committed. More leases are said to be in the works.
Stacom was long a Cushman vice chairman, and we’re not sure what her elevation to executive vice chairman means — any more than we knew exactly what it meant when Tighe was promoted 10 years ago to the title of vice chairman at CBRE’s predecessor firm, Insignia/ESG.
Commercial real estate titles don’t always have the same meaning they do in other industries. Suffice it to say that both brokers earned their new titles mainly on strong deal-making.
Tighe has enjoyed the higher profile, although both have received so many awards and been feted at so many luncheons and galas that rivals snark about it. They aren’t the only powerful and prolific deal-makers in town, of course. Nor are they the only ones to be publicly honored. But as superbrokers in a male-dominated field, their visibility makes them easy targets.
Tighe, of course, was Stacom’s opposite number in the Condé Nast deal at 1 WTC, where she represented the publishing giant in the complex negotiation. The brokers had to reconcile clashing imperatives of the Newhouse family, the PA, Durst, public officials, banks and architects, all with the media breathing down their necks.
Tighe has been a pioneer in catalyzing major corporate moves to previously unheard-of locations: her longtime client Condé Nast to 4 Times Square and now to the WTC, the New York Times Co. to Eighth Avenue, and Coach to Hudson Yards. They were game-changing transactions that altered perceptions about which parts of Manhattan were suitable for glamorous corporate headquarters.
None involved East Midtown. Tighe used her REBNY term as a bully pulpit to warn of the city office inventory’s increasing obsolescence — especially in that area. She lobbied City Hall to up-zone the vast and vital Grand Central district, where buildings are on average 60 years old but are almost impossible to replace under current rules. The rezoning measure, although controversial and subject to tinkering, is likely to be approved later this year.
So — with apologies to all the powerhouse brokers as successful as Tighe and Stacom but who happen not to be stepping up or down this week — congratulations to both on jobs well done.
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The northward Madison Avenue migration of high-end sportswear continues. Italian luxury prêt-à-porter brand Le Civette has signed a lease for its first US store at 1242 Madison between 89th and 90th streets.
La Civette has shops in Florence, Paris, Nice and in the Caribbean. On Madison, its retail neighbors include Armani Jr., Malia Mills and Robert Marc.
Douglas Elliman Retail Group’s Faith Hope Consolo and Joseph Aquino represented the tenant and landlord. The 1450-square-foot store is rented at $410 per square foot for 10 years.