Steve Roth will soon be the Prince of Meatpacking.
The Roth-led real estate investment powerhouse Vornado Realty Trust is in contract to lease the Prince Lumber site at the southwest corner of Ninth Ave. and 15th Street, just north of the Apple store, The Post has learned.
Vornado, along with Aurora Capital Associates, headed by Bobby Cayre, have inked a long-term lease for the manufacturing-zoned site and will bring it from wood to wow with a prominent, new approximately 12-story office and retail building.
Justin DiMare of NGKF Capital Markets, who represented the Prince Lumber owners in their upcoming relocation to West 47th Street, and had advised on the redevelopment of the 61 Ninth Ave. site, was marketing it to developers, sources said.
DiMare did not return requests for comment through a spokeswoman. Neither Roth nor the Aurora partnership returned calls and e-mails for comment.
Vornado, one of the largest city property owners, was scheduled to release its quarterly earnings after Monday’s stock market bell and release the Meatpacking news during its Tuesday-morning conference call with analysts.
This would be its first project in this area.
The site has a long 100 feet of frontage on the west side of Ninth Avenue before wrapping around the corner for another 170 feet along West 15th Street. As Ninth Avenue vehicles drive south, it will become a major focal point for the neighborhood.
Last year, The Post revealed Prince Lumber’s owners were going to relocate to Midtown West and redevelop the valuable Meatpacking District site themselves. At the time, they were planning a wavy glass retail and office tower designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox.
But since their real business is all wood, they quickly recognized building a complicated concrete-and-steel project near a major water tunnel was better left to other experts — so DiMare began offering it to others.
It is unclear if the original scheme will now be reworked or another major architect will be hired to design this new gateway to the Meatpacking District.
In the area, Aurora Capital and William Gottlieb Real Estate are redeveloping the former Pastis site nearby at 9-19 Ninth Ave.