55 Hudson Signs First Tenant

 By Gail Kalinoski, Contributing Editor

Fifty Five Hudson Yards, a 51-story, 1.3 million-square-foot office tower under construction on Manhattan’s Far West Side, has its first tenant now that Boies, Schiller & Flexner has agreed to move its legal practice to the Hudson Yards mega-development in 2018.

Boies, Schiller & Flexner, currently leasing 94,000 square feet at 575 Lexington Ave., will be taking 83,000 square feet across three floors at Fifty Five Hudson Yards, which is being developed by Related Cos., Mitsui Fudosan America, Inc. and Oxford Properties Group.

Bill Morris, principal, Arthur Mirante, president, and Greg Kraut, principal of Tri-State Region of Avison Young, represented Boies, Schiller & Flexner. Howard Fiddle of CBRE and Stephen Winter of Related represented the ownership group.

Construction started earlier this year on the tower, one of three office skyscrapers being built at the 28-acre Hudson Yards mixed-use development estimated to cost between $15 million and $20 million. The anticipated LEED Gold office tower is designed by A. Eugene Kohn of Kohn Pedersen Fox. Located at the northeast corner of 11^th Avenue and West 33^rd Street, it will be one of the few buildings in New York City that opens directly onto a park with the main lobby scheduled to sit on the southwestern edge of the new Hudson Park. The new No. 7 subway station is adjacent to the building and will open this year.

Easy access to transportation was one of the factors the law firm, noted for its high-powered litigation practice, cited in its decision to relocate to the city’s newest neighborhood.

“Fifty Five Hudson Yards is a perfect fit for our firm. The building’s strong and bold design is consistent with our firm’s positioning, and the new headquarters will allow us to offer a contemporary, light-filled office environment to our employees,” Jonathan Schiller, co-founder and a managing partner of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, said in a news release. “The building’s efficient core design was a key feature for us because we can reduce our leased area while still providing space to continue to grow our firm. This location and new building will help us continue to attract and retain the top talent, and we love the amenities and transportation access that will benefit our employees and clients.”

Boies, Schiller & Flexner isn’t the only major law firm making plans to relocate to the new Hudson Yards district on the Far West Side. In April, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom L.L.P. agreed to lease 550,000 square feet from Brookfield Property Partners, L.P. at its One Manhattan West office tower, a 2.1 million-square-foot skyscraper that will be the first of two commercial buildings at Brookfield’s $4.5 billion mixed-use project at a five-acre site at Ninth Avenue and 33^rd Street. Skadden will take floors 28 to 43 of the 67-story tower for its New York headquarters when its lease expires in 2020 at 4 Times Square. Brookfield is reportedly trying to sign another big legal tenant at One Manhattan West.

The two other office towers that are part of the Hudson Yards project are 10 HudsonYards, that will be home to Coach, Inc., L’Oreal USA and SAP, and 30 Hudson Yards, which will be the headquarters for Time Warner Inc. Once completed in 2024, the site will include 17 million square feet of commercial and residential space, more than 100 shops and restaurants, the city’s first Neiman Marcus store, a public school and Equinox branded luxury hotel with about 200 rooms.

The ownership group stated that construction on the 52-story 10 Hudson Yards is topping off and will be ready for occupancy in early 2016. The public space, residential and hotel towers and retail complex will be complete in 2018 and 30 Hudson Yards will be finished by 2019.