SL Green doesn’t know yet whether media giant Viacom will stay at 1515 Broadway – but the publicly traded commercial real estate giant isn’t waiting until then to put a gleaming new face on its imposing but little-adored Times Square tower.
Green, which bought the 2 million square-foot, 54-story building in 2002 for $480 million, has launched a $160 million capital-improvement program.
On the inside, it will include a new lobby, upgrades to the HVAC system and elevators, and environmental enhancements the owners hope will earn the building a silver LEED rating for energy efficiency.
But what Times Square’s zillions of visitors will notice will be on the outside.
One striking change, shown for the first time in a rendering on this page, will be a 42-foot tall vertical extension to the protruding glass curtain wall on the lower floors that house the MTV studio and the Minskoff Theater’s mezzanine lobby.
The facelift by architects Kohn Pedersen Fox will also overlay limestone portions of the façade and sharp-edged “crown” with brushed aluminum panels.
A few sheets have already been installed near the Minskoff entrance on West 45th Street, giving a hint how the finished job will look.
“In essence, we’re re-massing the building,” said Steve Durels, SL Green executive vice president and leasing chief. “Our goal is to give it more street presence and more drama, especially as you look at it the lower part.”
Although he didn’t mention it, the aluminum finish will also set 1515 Broadway off from the Marriott Marquis on the next block.
Right now, the stone portions of the two buildings tend to run together at first glance.
While tourists gape at the bright lights, commercial brokers know 1515 Broadway as a pioneer of Times Square’s transformation into a front-office district now home to Condé Nast, Thomson Reuters, Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers and Skadden Arps.
At 1515 Broadway, Viacom occupies 1.5 million square feet – or 95 percent of the tower’s office space – under several different leases with different expiration dates.
The largest lease, for 1 million feet, is up in 2010.
Durels said, “They have a renewal option we hope they’ll exercise, but what’s driving our renovation is not to rely upon fact that they’ll renew.”
Viacom has a total 2.5 million square feet in Manhattan. Last year, it moved its Comedy Central unit from 1775 Broadway to 345 Hudson St., fueling buzz that it might also partly or completely pull out of 1515 Broadway for cheaper rents downtown.
Durels said the average asking rent at 1515 is $90 a square foot. (All but 135,000 feet in the tower has been rented.)
Viacom’s existing lease is in the $50 a foot range, close to the “ask” at 345 Hudson.
Viacom is repped by CB Richard Ellis’ Michael Laginestra and Scott Gottlieb, who could not be reached.
Built from 1968-1970, 1515 Broadway was once reviled for replacing the beloved old Astor Hotel between West 44 and 45th streets.
The AIA Guide ridiculed its triangular “finial fins” at the top as resembling “the tail of an impaled spaceship.”
But SL Green has replaced schlocky retail and fast-food tenants with the likes of Billabong, the MTV store and a Bank of America branch.
The building owner dumped the old movie theaters for the live-music-oriented Nokia Theater.
“We spent $25 million to build the city’s state-of-the-art concert venue,” Durels said.
Enlarging the glass façade overlooking the “Crossroads of the World” promises to be the most noticeable change yet.
Durels said, “It’s not adding floor space, but is purely decorative. It will kind of square off the space and bring more logic to bottom of the tower, which now is slightly under whelming.”