Green Office Space
Midtown Midsummer Green Lease Update
Although the local real estate market has certainly cooled in the past few months, leasing activity at two of Midtown’s highest profile green commercial projects continues to remain hot. Marathon Asset Management, which agreed to pay $115 per square foot for the 38th and 39th floors at LEED Platinum hopeful Bank of America Tower in early 2007, recently agreed to a 5-year sublet for a portion of its space with Korean financial firm Mirae Asset for $150 per square foot. Although Marathon isn’t the only financial services firm that’s looked to shed space in light of current market conditions, it’s a good sign that demand is still strong for premium Class A space, though whether One Bryant Park’s green features are driving the significant lease premium is obviously pure speculation. Meanwhile, at LEED Gold hopeful, 350,000-square-foot 510 Madison Avenue, only one tenant has signed a lease, albeit at a whopping $150 per square foot.
Popularity: 20% [?]
29Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Port Authority Releases Renderings for Proposed LEED Gold 20 Times Square
At a meeting held earlier today, the Port Authority unveiled renderings from three firms for 20 Times Square, the 1.3 million-square foot, 42-story LEED (for Core and Shell) Gold tower that Vornado Realty Trust and Ruben Cos. plan to co-develop above the north wing of the agency’s Bus Terminal on 8th Avenue. From left to right in the image, Pelli Clarke Pelli (The Visionaire), Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners (Tower 3 at the World Trade Center along Greenwich Street), and KPF (Court Square Two, One Jackson Square, and the Beer Belly Building) present three very different visions for the tower, ranging from Pelli’s artistic curtain wall and KPF’s glass box that evokes the Lever House (and Boston Properties’ “redux” on West 55th Street) to Rogers’ series of stacked boxes that is easily the most ambitious of the three concepts.
Popularity: 21% [?]
24Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
7 WTC Tenant to Build 5-Star Green Resort in Bermuda
Scout Real Estate Capital, whose New York City offices are located on the 34th floor of Larry Silverstein’s LEED Gold-certified 7 World Trade Center, announced earlier this week that construction on a 5-star resort hotel in Bermuda’s Southampton Parish should commence in September after local officials approve the firm’s preliminary design plans. Scout has already commenced demolition of the Wyndham Beach Resort (which currently occupies the site) and is recycling reclaimed copper and concrete from the property. The firm intends to seek an unspecified LEED rating for the $300 million project, which should open up sometime in 2011, feature 150 guest rooms, and draw power from an on-site solar array.
Popularity: 17% [?]
22Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
NBBJ Earns Manhattan’s Ninth LEED-CI Rating at 2 Rector Street
Global architecture firm NBBJ recently earned a LEED Silver rating from USGBC for its new New York City offices at 2 Rector Street downtown. The space is the ninth in Manhattan to cop a LEED for Commercial Interiors rating, and joins a number of other design professional spaces that have earned the designation. Three of NBBJ’s five U.S. offices have now earned LEED certification; the firm’s offices downtown occupy 15,917 square feet across the 25th floor of the 80-year-old building. The firm spent over five months reconfiguring its space, and signed a 10-year lease that takes advantage of a number of tax incentives offered to businesses relocating to Lower Manhattan. NBBJ principal Timothy Johnson said that the firm “had to solve the puzzle of taking an 80-year-old building with older infrastructure and making it sustainable.”
Popularity: 15% [?]
18Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Law Firm Pays $90 s/f at BXP’s -EB 7 Times Square
The law firm Hiscock & Barclay signed a four-year lease earlier this week for 12,500 square feet of space at Boston Properties’ 7 Times Square (Times Square Tower), which is currently seeking a LEED for Existing Buildings rating from USGBC. The firm is actually subleasing the space from another law firm- Brown Rudnick- and will pay approximately $90 per square foot. The 47-story, David Childs-designed Times Square Tower opened up back in 2004 without an anchor tenant after the Arthur Andersen implosion.
Popularity: 13% [?]
17Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Credit Markets, Lack of Tenants May Trim Vornado’s LEED Silver Harlem Tower
Just before Bon Jovi opened up Saturday night’s All-Star Concert in Central Park, a Major League Baseball rep encouraged the crowd to “tune in” to the new MLB Network once it launches in 2009. Late last week, though, a report surfaced that Vornado, which will develop the $435 million, 21-story Swanke Hayden Connell-designed LEED Silver Harlem Tower at the corner of 125th Street and Park Avenue that’s meant to house the new network, is planning on cutting the building’s size by close to a third due to its inability to secure financing for the project. Vornado has also had difficulty securing any tenants in addition to MLB; the developer had been negotiating with Midtown-based Inner City Broadcasting, the country’s second-largest radio company that targets African-American listeners, but has yet to officially secure a lease with the broadcaster, while a rumored retail lease with Macy’s never materialized either.
Popularity: 17% [?]
14Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 2 comments | Continued
Law Firm Purchases Manhattan’s “Original” Green Building for $70M
700 Broadway calls itself New York City’s “original” green building; the 10-story, 100,000-square-foot tower dates from 1891 and is the former home of the National Audubon Society, which purchased the building in 1989 while it was abandoned during a much seedier era in the Village. The organization sold the building in 2006 to the Lincoln Property Company for $53 million and (as we wrote about recently) moved earlier this year to the seventh floor of 225 Varick Street. The Audubon Society has outfitted that space with a number of green design features in pursuit of a LEED-CI Platinum rating from USGBC. Oddly enough, a local plaintiffs’ law firm that has likely made millions prosecuting claims arising out of exposure to decidedly non-green building materials such as asbestos and lead paint has purchased 770 Broadway for $70 million.
Popularity: 29% [?]
8Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 2 comments | Continued
Time Warner Center Cops National Building of the Year Honors
Related’s Time Warner Center, which won BOMA’s regional competition for commercial office buildings greater than 1 million square feet back in the spring, has been named The Office Building of the Year (”TOBY”) for 2008-2009 by the Building Owners and Managers Association International in the 1 million-square-foot or greater category. The tower earned the honor at BOMA’s annual conference a couple of weeks ago in Denver and joins 13 other awardees in a number of building types. The international honor comes after the Time Warner Center won at both the local and regional level.
Popularity: 20% [?]
7Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
ML: Skanska USA to Seek Empire State Building’s First Platinum Rating
Skanska USA, the U.S. division of Swedish construction giant Skanska AB, is retrofitting the 32nd floor of the Empire State Building in pursuit of a LEED for Commercial Interiors Platinum rating from USGBC. Ranked by Engineering News-Record as America’s number 1 green contractor for 2007, Skanska USA’s area general manager Steve Pressler explained the firm’s philosophy behind the move in a press release, noting that Skanska’s “push for Platinum LEED certification not only aligns with our core business philosophies, but demonstrates to our current and existing clients our commitment to the green movement.” The construction giant signed a deal for a 15-year lease on the tower’s 32nd floor and will take 24,400 square feet upon moving from its current headquarters at 136 Madison Avenue.
Popularity: 17% [?]
7Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
New York City’s First Green Billboard Set for Times Square
Times Square is about to receive New York City’s first green-powered electronic billboard. Tokyo-based Ricoh Company, Ltd. will install a 47 by 126 foot sign on the Reuters Building (3 Times Square, at the northwestern corner of 42nd Street and 7th Avenue) that will draw power from 45 solar panels and 4 wind turbines. In what should be an interesting twist, if the photovoltaics do not receive sufficient sunlight or winds are not strong enough to drive the turbines, the sign will simply not illuminate. According to Ricoh, the installation should account for a reduction of 18 tons in carbon dioxide per year.
Popularity: 51% [?]
3Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Darby & Darby’s Offices at 7 WTC by GKV Architects
The intellectual property law firm Darby & Darby moved into the 41st and 42nd floors of LEED Gold-certified 7 World Trade Center last June. Gerner Kronick + Valcarel, Architects designed the firm’s 80,000-square-foot space, which includes a stainless steel, tension rod-suspended glass staircase that connects a two-story conference/multi-purpose room. GKV’s design emphasizes the natural light provided by 7 WTC’s floor to ceiling windows. Stretch fabric ceilings were installed in each of the office’s conference rooms and glass sidelights connect perimeter office doors to maximize light penetration into the interior.
Popularity: 24% [?]
27Jun2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
ML: COFRA Group, Perkins+Will Complete –CI Gold Office at 277 Park
Perkins+Will recently completed a 30,000-square-foot fit-out of Switzerland-based investment conglomerate COFRA Group’s offices on the 29th floor of 277 Park Avenue in Midtown. The project is seeking a LEED Gold rating from USGBC under the Commercial Interiors system and includes numerous green design features, ranging from locally-sourced wood paneling and water-efficient fixtures to recycled-content glass partitions designed to increase the penetration of natural light. The space also features LED lighting and recycled denim insulation.
Popularity: 20% [?]
23Jun2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Kimball Office Showroom Earns LEED-CI Certified Rating at 215 Park Avenue
Kimball Office has received New York City’s latest LEED for Commercial Interiors (”LEED-CI”) rating, copping the Certified designation from USGBC. Its 12,000-square-foot showroom at 215 Park Avenue South was designed in cooperation with TVS Interiors. The showroom officially opened back in January and features a number of sustainable design features ranging from 75 percent recycled construction debris to low-VOC, local, and recycled-content materials, low-flow plumbing, and energy-efficient appliances.
Popularity: 19% [?]
18Jun2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued-
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