Convene Assuming New Flagship at 114 West 47th Street
By Terence Cullen March 9, 2016 3:30 pm
reprints
Convene, the company that provides space for convening, will open a three-floor flagship location at 114 West 47th Street, the Durst Organization announced in a press release.
The company has signed a deal for 35,698 square feet at the 658,000-square-foot building between Avenue of the Americas and Seventh Avenue, according to the landlord. That covers the ground floor, second floor and lower level of the 26-story structure, and it will be able to accommodate 500 guests.
Part of the deal gives Convene its own private entrance to the building on West 46th Street, according to Durst. The south side of the property will officially have an address of 117 West 46th Street for the company to use.
“Convene’s new space at 114 West 47th Street will offer a unique alternative to the standard meeting and conference spaces at hotels and convention centers,” Durst President Jonathan “Jody” Durst said in prepared remarks. “The venue will be a tremendous asset to our tenants as well as the surrounding neighborhood.”
Asking rent on the ground floor of the building is $200 per square foot and for office space is $68 per square foot, according to The New York Post, which first reported news of the deal.
Jared Freede, Rocco Laginestra and Michael Wellen of CBRE (CBRE) represented the meeting- and event-space provider, while Tom Bow and Rocco Romeo of Durst represented the landlord in-house. The brokers for the tenant were not immediately available for comment, per a CBRE spokeswoman.
“We conducted focus groups, surveys and market studies to understand planner pain points and reverse engineered a venue that solves all of them and more,” Ryan Simonetti, the chief executive officer of Convene, said in a statement. “The end result is a flagship Convene venue perfectly designed to host large meetings and events that is conveniently located in the heart of midtown.”
