Posted: 3:24 am
July 29, 2008
MACKLOWE Properties wasted no time finding a fancy retail tenant for 510 Madison Ave.
Luxury watch emporium Tourneau has signed a lease for a 3,300 square-foot store at the fast-rising tower's East 53rd Street corner, where 25-foot ceilings and floor-to-ceiling windows can provide a glittering showcase for 8,000 timepieces from watchmakers such as Rolex, Cartier and the Tourneau brand.
The new store will replace a smaller one that Tourneau has long had at the same block's south corner.
Macklowe Properties Chairman and CEO Billy Macklowe said 510 Madison Ave. will top off Thursday and be ready for move-in by year's end.
So far, the 350,000 square-foot project has signed only one office tenant, investment firm Jay Goldman & Co., which took an entire floor.
But Macklowe shrugged off concerns about the slowing economy, noting, "I think all markets cycle. We're still in the Plaza District, the premier business district in Manhattan."
He added that 510 Madison's intimate floor plates, and lavish amenities including private dining, health club, pool and advanced environmental features make it ideal for the high-end tenants he's seeking.
Meanwhile, pedestrians have been taken with the remarkable effect created by 510 Madison's shimmering glass curtain wall.
Reflecting its surroundings like a mirror, it seems to duplicate the brick façades of buildings on the other side of the avenue, softening what might have been a harsh intrusion of 21st Century materials amid prewar environs.
Asked whether that was by design, Macklowe chuckled, "It's hard to say what the intent was, but, yes, it [the glass curtain wall] reads as our neighbors."
He said the asking rent on the Tourneau space was $600 per square foot. Macklowe was repped in-house by Jason Grebin and Andrew Lazarus. Robert K. Futterman repped the tenant.
Larry Silverstein is going for the grand-slam he's patiently awaited ever since his 7 World Trade Center opened two years ago.
The developer and HSBC are inching toward a deal for the banking giant to lease nearly 300,000 square feet on the tower's top seven floors.
But this is fast-track inching.
