Acadia Realty JV Breaks Ground on Dallas Mixed-Use Project

Acadia Realty Trust and Ignite-Rebees have started construction of a $95.5 million mixed-use project on North Henderson Avenue in Dallas. Balfour Beatty serves as general contractor for the 161,000-square-foot development that’s slated for completion by the fall of 2026.

Designed by GFF, a Dallas-based architecture firm, the project is taking shape on a nearly 4.8-acre site on the eastern side of North Henderson Avenue that has been vacant for decades. The area will be beautified with new street paving, decorative crosswalks, landscaping and buried utility lines.

Once complete, the campus will comprise 10 buildings and public spaces and span a quarter-mile stretch of North Henderson Avenue between Glencoe Street and McMillan Avenue. The area will be transformed into a walkable destination featuring retail brands, chef-driven restaurants and Class A office space.

Plans call for 75,000 square feet of retail space, 74,000 square feet of office space, 12,000 square feet of restaurant space and 500 underground parking spaces. Open Realty Advisors will handle retail leasing. Newmark will lease the office space, which has been dubbed Henderson East.

Long-term project

D Magazine reported the project has been in the works since at least 2018, when rezoning was approved. New York-based Acadia Realty Trust acquired 15 retail assets along with future development and redevelopment sites on Henderson Avenue for $85.4 million in April 2022, according to the REIT’s second-quarter 2022 earnings report.

The Henderson Avenue Portfolio included well-known retailers such as Warby Parker, Tecovas and Bonobos, a Sprouts Farmers Market and some of the city’s most popular restaurants. The earnings report stated, “The demonstrated success of the retailers and restauranteurs on Henderson Avenue serves as a promising proof of concept for what is to come.”

Located in East Dallas, the existing portfolio and planned development is in proximity to some of the city’s most affluent communities including Highland Park, University Park, Uptown and Lakewood.

Acadia stated it planned to add retail and office space to further connect and activate the already thriving Henderson district. Acadia partnered with Dallas-based Ignite-Rebees, a joint venture between well-known Dallas restaurateur Tristan Simon and Mark Masinter, founder of Open Realty Advisors and chairman of global retail for Newmark, according to D Magazine. Simon, Open Realty and CIM Group, which later sold the portfolio to Acadia, had purchased properties along Henderson in 2012.

Mixed-use focus

For Dallas-based Balfour Beatty, the Henderson project gives the national construction firm another chance to add to its hometown portfolio. It will be the company’s latest mixed-use project in Dallas, where it’s currently working with ANDRES Construction Services on the Knox Street mixed-use development for joint venture partners MSD Partners, Trammell Crow Co., The Retail Connection and Highland Park Village Associates.

Balfour Beatty also completed Epic II, a 23-story, Class A office building in the Deep Ellum Epic mixed-use development. The tower has 480,000 square feet of office space on 16 levels atop a 70,000-square-foot amenities level and 665,000-square-foot parking garage.