Legendary Group Plans 350K-SF Creative Office in LA
Construction will start next year and is expected to be complete by early 2026.
By Greg Cornfield May 25, 2022 7:30 pm
reprints
A local developer has big plans to construct a 350,000-square-foot speculative creative office in the expanding Arts District of Downtown Los Angeles.
L.A.-based Legendary Group has secured entitlements to build the 17-story Class A project called Above at 411 South Hewitt Street. It will include 311,000 square feet of office space over 12 floors and 22,000 square feet of ground-floor production space, along with space for either retail or food and beverage.
Construction will start next year and is expected to be complete by early 2026. Cushman & Wakefield (CWK)’s Mike Condon Jr., Brittany Winn, McKenna Gaskill, Pete Collins and Scott Menkus will lead leasing efforts for Above.
“The project [calls for] multiple, high-clear spaces on the ground floor and throughout the stack, which is tailored toward an explosion of production and creative tenants in need of space with volume,” Winn said in a statement. “Of the 4 million square feet of new inquiries we have seen over the last 12 months in the Arts District, over 25 percent of these requirements have included a need for high-clear space, and Above has been designed to meet the demands of the market.”
The Arts District was a derelict warehouse district a decade ago, but has seen a transformational redevelopment boom since. The neighborhood has been a magnet for development with projects ranging from members-only social club Soho House to a Related Companies office development. The submarket is also a federally designated opportunity zone, which allows investors to defer capital gains taxes should they invest in real estate.
Last May, Atlas Capital Group announced a $650 million soundstage development near the Arts District, and SteelWave acquired a newly constructed office and retail campus from CEG Construction for $80 million. Last summer, Rexford Industrial Realty acquired a four-building creative industrial business park for $94 million.
Continuum Partners also plans to build a $1.5 billion to $2 billion project in the Arts District with more than 400,000 square feet of office space, a hotel and 1,500 multifamily units, and the firm is also working on a 13-story mixed-use development on Mateo Street.
“The Arts District has recently seen an emergence of tenants looking for unique creative office space as demand looks to outweigh supply. We received nearly 800,000 square feet in tenant inquiries in Q1 2022,” Gaskill said. “Tenants’ desire to grow their business here is stronger than ever, exemplified by several recent headquarters relocations into the area by prominent companies in a variety of industries.”
Other major projects include a 113,000-square-foot office development underway by Lowe and Related Companies. The parent company of Warner Music Group acquired the 255,000-square-foot Ford Factory adaptive reuse project in 2020 for $193.5 million. Hines plans to build a 450,000-square-foot of office next to the former Ford plant.
In 2019, Legendary Group and Brookfield Residential developed Aliso mixed-use project in the Arts District with 472 live/work units over 22,000 square feet of ground-floor commercial space. The Aliso was built and has enjoyed great leasing success.
“New developments such as Above, along with under construction projects like 2130 Violet, and 520 Mateo look to be the next wave of modern high-rise projects propelling the Arts District beyond a mom-and-pop, adaptive reuse market into what should be the top tenant-attracting market in all of Los Angeles,” Condon said.
Gregory Cornfield can be reached at gcornfield@commercialobserver.com.
