By Patrick Hedlund
Holy sculpture garden The vacant lot owned by Trinity Real Estate at Canal St. and Sixth Ave. in Hudson Square will host a grouping of large-scale, interactive sculpture installations over the next few years through a partnership between the real estate big and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council.
The announcement from Trinity came last week after Mixed Use had inquired previously about a planned “interim use” at the site, which will go undeveloped for at least the next two years as the dominant neighborhood property owner mulls future construction options.
The 37,000-square-foot, triangular plot will contain about four outdoor works that will rotate on a yearly basis as part of the L.M.C.C.’s Swing Space program, according to Erin Roeder, Trinity’s director of Strategic Neighborhood Development.
The installations will include “inhabitable or semi-inhabitable” pieces with up to 400 square feet of interior space each, including work by both emerging and well-established Downtown artists, said L.M.C.C. curator Adam Kleinman.
The site will also incorporate innovative landscape design, he added, playing off the area’s diverse neighborhood flavors and heavy pedestrian and car traffic. The plot will not likely include greenery, Kleinman noted, but will allow for pedestrians to pass through the space and interact with the installations.
“It will most probably have contemplative or relaxational space,” he said, with the first works to be installed by as early as spring to “get it up for when people would most likely be outside.”
Luxury Katz A lot has been made of one of the Lower East Side’s newest developments, The Ludlow, a 23-story luxury residential building at Ludlow and E. Houston Sts. that has leased more than half its units after opening in September.
Advertisements for the 243-unit development — which invite tenants to “Live like a Rockefeller” and “Party like a rock star” — have helped the building reach the 60 percent-leased mark after sellers began offering incentives for residents to offset a slow opening.
The Ludlow includes studios, one-bedrooms and two-bedrooms starting at $2,890 per month and going up to $5,800, with some units featuring home office space. According to Erik Rose, vice president of real estate for developer Edison Properties, only one one-bedroom with a home office component remains, while all the studio/home office units have been leased.
Incentives such as a month’s free rent, suspended broker fees, free moving services and free storage have been offered to lure potential tenants, reportedly as a way to combat any possible ill effects of an unpredictable market.
The luxe high-rise sits across the street from the historic Katz’s Deli in what has become a hotbed for development and nightlife activity. Amenities at the building include a fitness center and yoga studio, a multimedia lounge and billiards center, 24-hour concierge and valet service, common roof deck and building-wide wireless Internet service. Everything Rockefeller/rock star could ask for.
Courting the cognoscenti District, the swanky 10-story condo development at 111 Fulton St. wrought through a partnership of design and nightlife impresarios, announced recently that over 75 percent of its units have been sold since hitting the market six months ago.
The 163-unit building — which has been “discreetly marketed and popularized primarily through the buzz among cognoscenti familiar with the works of renowned international interior designer Andres Escobar, lifestyle doyenne Amy Sacco and award-winning architect Karl Fischer,” to quote its verbose press release — contains one-bedroom to penthouse units priced between $515,000 and $3.395 million.
The amenity-stacked project, marketed by JC DeNiro and developed by Leviev Fulton Club, L.L.C., includes a fitness center with indoor pool, 16-jet spa and cold plunge; a screening room; a lounge/library with fireplace and billiards table; and a 12,000-square-foot roof terrace with panoramic views, four lighted reflecting pools, chaise lounges and eight cabanas.
Interior aficionado Escobar and nightlife maven Sacco lend their name cachet to Israeli billionaire Lev Leviev’s effort to court the Financial District’s increasingly upscale gentry, although Mixed Use wonders how much rooftop “reflecting” high-end tenants will be able to enjoy with the seemingly endless amount of construction work on Fulton St.
McSam hits Water Hotel magnate Sam Chang — he of the semi-eponymous McSam Hotel Group—has scooped up the five-story property at 6-12 Water St., between Moore and Broad Sts.
According to reports, the prolific hotelier who has battled Downtown residents over the years purchased the 21,000-square-foot property for $27 million, which fittingly for McSam includes a two-story McDonald’s restaurant on the building’s ground floor.
A future hotel would add to the steady stream of new projects announced over the next few years in Lower Manhattan, with total rooms expected to double and nearly 20 new Downtown projects under construction or announced.
C.B.R.E. tops retail survey A survey by the Lipsey Company of real estate professionals from around the world has named the CB Richard Ellis the No. 1 brand in commercial real estate for the seventh consecutive year. More than 20,000 real estate professionals participated in the survey, which measures how industry participants perceive commercial real estate brands.
The Los Angeles-based C.B.R.E. is the world’s largest commercial real estate services firm, in terms of 2007 revenue, with over 29,000 employees in more than 300 offices worldwide.
The Lipsey Company provides training and consulting for the commercial real estate industry.
mixeduse@communitymediallc.com
