NYC’s 1 World Trade Center Tower Gets 2 More Tenants

By Jonathan LaMantia

June 25, 2014 12:55 PM EDT

Lower Manhattan’s 1 World Trade Center is about 56 percent leased after two additional tenants agreed to rent space in the tower, the tallest in the Western Hemisphere.

Legends Hospitality LLC, the company that will operate the skyscraper’s observatory, is taking 4,759 square feet (442 square meters) and BMB Group, a London-based investment adviser to sovereign-wealth funds, will rent 2,191 square feet, according to a statement today by the Durst Organization, the building’s co-developer.

The deals follow an agreement last month by advertising firm KiDS Creative LLC for 34,775 square feet on the 87th floor, which was the first lease signed at the 3 million-square-foot tower in three years. The building, which will have Conde Nast Publications Inc. as its anchor tenant, is scheduled to open before year’s end.

“Tenant prospects appreciate the status and allure” of having offices in the 1,776-foot (541-meter) skyscraper, Eric Engelhardt, director of leasing at 1 World Trade Center for Durst, said in the statement. “This globally recognized address resonates perfectly with these companies’ own international reach and prestige.”

Legends Hospitality is led by Chairman and CEO Dave Checketts, former president of the National Basketball Association’s New York Knicks. The company, owned by Checketts Partners Investors Fund, the New York Yankees and the Dallas Cowboys, will run the observatory on floors 100 to 102 of 1 World Trade Center. It will have management and administrative offices on the 45th floor, according to the statement.

Downtown Leasing

BMB Group, which is renting space on the tower’s 46th floor, is relocating from the nearby 7 World Trade Center. Both companies’ leases are for 10 years, according the Durst Organization, which is developing the skyscraper with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The tower and neighboring 4 World Trade Center, which opened in November, are bringing more than 2 million square feet of empty space to the lower Manhattan market. In the year through May, office leasing downtown rose 38 percent from a year earlier to 972,000 square feet, the most for the period since 2000, according to a report by CBRE Group Inc.

Conde Nast, the publisher of titles including Vogue, Vanity Fair and GQ, will occupy almost 1.2 million square feet at 1 World Trade Center.