Today in Pictures - CityCenter DC

CityCenter DC - the mega development in the heart of downtown - is at last celebrating an executed lease for office space at the two office buildings on 11th Street.  Law firm giant Covington and Burling officially announced this week they will occupy 420,000 s.f. in the office buildings when they move in the summer of 2014, accounting for 80% of the office space.  Developers Archstone and Hines and Qatari financial backer Barwa Bank.

The 10-acre project will feature two condominiums, two apartment buildings, and the two office buildings, as well as 295,000 s.f. of retail that developers are hoping will create a new fashion center downtown.  Developers hope to turn over the retail space to tenants in late 2013, with retailers beginning to open in early 2014.  In their excitement at the office lease, Hines released a new rendering of the office building at 10th & H Streets.

Below are photos of the project from this week:

Photography by Rey Lopez

Chinatown: Monument Looks to Expand Foothold

A few lots on H Street near the intersection of 7th and H, NW are some of the last undeveloped lots in Chinatown / Penn Quarter.  If things go as planned, Monument Realty's 10-storey Gallery Tower will occupy the vacant parcel at 627 and 631 H Street NW, just a block from the corner.  The future 10-story building, with a design by architect Chris Morrison with Cunningham Quill, is due for delivery in 2014.  The site formerly housed China Doll Gourmet, which closed in 2006 and was razed shortly thereafter.

Monument Realty acquired the empty parcel in 2011 after foreclosing on the note it bought from Yeni Wong in 2010.  Wong had plans to develop the whole corner, but failed to secure financing when financial markets soured around 2008.  Douglas Development scooped up the neighboring corner lot to the west - 675 H Street NW - last year during the same week Monument clinched 627-631, from the auctioneer.  Douglas also owns the Vapiano building to the east of the Gallery Tower spot.

Gallery Tower rendering
courtesy of Monument Realty

According to one company representative, Monument hopes to expand its foothold in the neighborhood of Chinatown / Penn Quarter.  According to director of marketing Natasha Stancill, Monument's acquisition team is looking for opportunities to develop a residential parcel close to the future Gallery Tower site. She said the firm was excited about its plans for Chinatown.  "We are looking at other possibilities in the area because it is such a vibrant, exciting part of town," Stancill told DCMud.

The Gallery Tower building plan calls for two floors, or 11,000 square feet, of retail and another 60,000 s.f. office space on floors three through 10.  The project went through zoning, Office of Planning (OP), area neighborhood commission (ANC), and Chinatown Design review approvals processes when Yeni Wong controlled the property.  According to the project's development manager Pam Frentzel-Beyme, the first two floors will likely house a restaurant.

Frentzel-Beyme said the building's location would be its biggest selling point. "You can't beat being next to Gallery Place, and the design is really modern but also compliments Chinatown's history."  A lot of Chinatown's office space, she noted, is in historic buildings where tenants don't get the great views that she said Gallery Tower, with its large, modern windows, would one day offer.

The  former China Doll Gourmet was on the site

Developers describe the future Gallery Tower, with floor plates that are less than 8,000 square feet, a "Class A boutique space." "We'll be targeting the type of tenant that is not going to want much more (than 8,000 square feet)," Frentzel-Beyme said.  She said Monument would be targeting businesses with a "fun and creative employee base", such as design or architectural firms.  "They are young, they might want to grab dinner, go over to the Verizon center, but don't necessarily need 50,000 square feet of space."

Gallery Tower is now in the building permit process and Monument says it will break ground in the first part of next year.

Floor plan courtesy of Monument Realty

Floor plan courtesy of Monument Realty

Floor plan courtesy of Monument Realty

Washington D.C. real estate development news

Pennsylvania Avenue Office Building Redesign

David M. Schwarz Architects announced today it has been hired to redesign portions of the prominent Pennsylvania Building at 1275 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, and will begin work this fall.  The '50's office building was redeveloped in the '80's by owner Willco Companies, which purchased the building in the late '60's for $6,600,000. The 286,000 s.f. building was modernized in 2007.

The Pennsylvania Building sits across from Freedom Plaza and the Wilson Building.  Construction will entail re-skinning the lower three floors of the exterior stone façade, redesigning the metal and glass office entry marquee, a new rooftop terrace overlooking Pennsylvania Avenue, and a redesigned office lobby.

Shwarz is also designing 2700 Woodley in Woodley Park, JBG's U Street hotel and the addition to Ceasar's Palace in Las Vegas.

Washington D.C. real estate development news

David M. Schwarz Architects announced today it has been hired to redesign portions of the prominent Pennsylvania Building at 1275 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, and will begin work this fall.  The '50's office building was redeveloped in the '80's by owner Willco Companies, which purchased the building in the late '60's for $6,600,000. The 286,000 s.f. building was modernized in 2007.

The Pennsylvania Building sits across from Freedom Plaza and the Wilson Building.  Construction will entail re-skinning the lower three floors of the exterior stone façade, redesigning the metal and glass office entry marquee, a new rooftop terrace overlooking Pennsylvania Avenue, and a redesigned office lobby. 

Shwarz is also designing 2700 Woodley in Woodley Park, JBG's U Street hotel and the addition to Ceasar's Palace in Las Vegas.

Washington D.C. real estate development news

MRP’s Penn Quarter “Trophy” Office Loses Investment Partner, Gains Investment Partner

MidAtlantic Realty Partners, LLC (or MRP) announced it has a new joint-venture partner in ASB Real Estate Investments to build its previously announced Class A “trophy” office building planned at the southwest corner of Ninth and G Streets in Penn Quarter and intends to begin construction this summer. The former investment partner was Rockpoint Group LLC.


Regardless of the change in ownership, it doesn’t appear that anything else will be different - MRP is still going to the dance, just with a new date on its arm.

Construction on the former National Capital Area YWCA site is set to commence this summer, and it’s still planned as a nine-story, 112,000 s.f., LEED Gold building with a glass curtain wall. It’s also still being designed by San Francisco-based Gensler.

So life’s pretty much the same 900 G Street, and for MRP, save for the hand that feeds it.

Washington D.C. real estate development news

Will Old Post Office Deal Accelerate Hoover Building's Demise and FTC's Move From Apex?

The General Services Administration's controversial nod to billionaire Donald Trump's bid for underutilized Old Post Office has refocused attention on the eastern end of Pennsylvania Ave. where several key government buildings could be in play.

Top of the list is the J. Edgar Hoover Building between Ninth and Tenth Street.

In November 2011, the Government Accountability Office released a report detailing what to do with the tired and unpopular J. Edgar Hoover FBI building on Pennsylvania Avenue. The Hoover Building, a Brutalist piece of concrete completed in 1974, has few current fans, even among the District's vocal preservationist crowd.

"Nobody will shed a tear when it goes," said Steve Calcott of the District's Historic Preservation Review Board. It's also much maligned as a "block-killer" for Penn Quarter as security considerations nixed any plans for street level retail. "We're just waiting for the day when the bulldozers arrive," said Karyn LeBlanc of the Downtown DC Business Improvement District.

The structure is equally unloved by the G-men as well, apparently. According to the GAO report, leaks, lack of windows, and poor access make the Hoover Building despised by its inhabitants, many of whom are now farmed out to other buildings in the D.C. area post-9/11 for security reasons.

The FBI desperately needs to centralize those agents to streamline operations and react more swiftly to threats. That's compounded by the fact that since 9/11, the number of FBI personnel working in and around Washington has nearly doubled, from 9,600 in 2001 to more than 17,600 in 2010. Given too that the FBI building and its agents are a prime terrorist target, the GAO's report also references key security weaknesses in the building (the specifics of which are classified in this report) that make it a prime candidate for replacement outside of the aesthetics.

The GAO's recommendations should cheer anybody eagerly awaiting a wrecking ball for the old structure. The government watchdog agency noted that at 2007 prices, remodeling the existing Hoover Building to come into compliance with EnergyStar and LEED certification would top $1.9 billion and take nearly a decade and half of work to complete.

Conversely, demolishing the unloved building and replacing it with another at the same site would cost a relative pittance, just $850 million, completed over nine years. Meanwhile, building the FBI a new headquarters somewhere else in the Washington metro area would cost about $1.2 billion and take seven years.

The rapid appreciation of real estate prices on Pennsylvania Avenue could make selling the land to a private developer an incentive for the GSA to find a new home for the FBI. The land that was $41 a square foot in 1963, when the GSA purchased 233,000 s.f. to build the FBI building, is now worth more than one hundred times that, says Gerry Widdicombe, director of economic development at the Downtown DC BID.

That would mean a windfall for the GSA of $500 million to $800 million, (minus $20 million or so for demolition) -- half the cost of building a new FBI building on a new site, Widdicome said.

It would also create a prime spot for a developer to bring more retail, given that Donald Trump plans a luxury hotel and restaurant across the street. "You knock down the FBI building, you can have a serious conversation with a department store like Harrods, or Bloomingdales, or Selfridges, since you would have the necessary volume," he said. "There's no doubt that the Trump deal for the Old Post Office will move the conversation about the FBI building forward."

While a suburban campus location for the FBI might appear the ideal choice, if only to free up the

real estate beneath the building, Britain's FBI equivalent, MI5 has stayed in Central London as the agency has grown, moving into a rehabbed government building, Thames House (right) in 1994.

Towards the same end of Pennsylvania Avenue, the Art Deco Apex building, built in 1938 and currently occupied by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission is also being sought after as an expansion for the National Gallery of Art. Rep. John Mica, a Florida Republican who heads the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and oversees the GSA's plan of disposing federal buildings, has made it clear he wants the FTC out of the Apex Building and the National Gallery of Art in. "One way or another we are going to get that building," he told GSA head Robert Peck in a recent hearing on Capitol Hill.

Despite criticism of the Donald Trump deal for the Old Post Office Pavilion, the GSA has had recent success in transforming dormant federal

properties into vibrant spaces. In 2002, the GSA partnered with San Francisco-based Kimpton Hotels to open the Hotel Monaco in Penn Quarter in the former Tariff Building which had stood empty since 1987. The opening of the hotel was soon followed by the Spy Museum and Zola restaurant in the 800 block of F Street.

Widdicome said that demolishing the block-killing Hoover Building, as well as re-purposing the Federal Trade Commission building as a museum, together with the new 250-room Trump Hotel at the site of the Old Post Office Building would go a long way towards improving the Eastern end of Pennsylvania Avenue, which columnist Russell Baker called "a marble graveyard" after dark.

Next up, says Widdicome, will be repurposing the underused Pershing Park and Freedom Plaza, as well as relighting Pennsylvania Avenue to make it more amenable to pedestrians. "Things are finally falling into place for Pennsylvania Avenue," he said.

Washington D.C. real estate redevelopment news.

MRP Plans "Trophy" Office Space in Penn Quarter

MidAtlantic Realty Partners LLC, better known as MRP, today announced a joint venture with real estate investment management firm Rockpoint Group LLC to build a new Class A "trophy" office building at the southwest corner of 9th and G Streets in Penn Quarter, the former location of the National Capital Area YWCA.

The 112,000 s.f., nine-story building will be designed by San Francisco-based Gensler. Like many of its Washington contemporaries it will include a glass-wrapped exterior with nine-foot ceilings for levels two through seven and two penthouse levels with ten-foot ceilings that have views of the Capitol and the Washington Monument. The company says it will be LEED-Gold certified and will also include a "green" roof with storm water treatment. MRP says the building will use 12 percent less energy and 40 percent less water than typical office spaces.

"We will develop a dramatic building that visually captures the corner while creating an active and memorable street-level retail experience," said Bob Murphy, managing partner of MRP Realty in a statement.

Julie Chase, a spokeswoman for MRP says the tenants of the 9-story building currently on the site are expected to move out by June of this year and that the building will be torn down "immediately after." Chase said MRP was not willing to release the overall costs of the construction. "They will be commensurate with a high-quality trophy building," she said.

The corner is already home to the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe-designed

Martin Luther King Jr. library, and will sit astride the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, the National Portrait Gallery and Gallery Place Metro, connecting to the Red, Green and Yellow lines. Skanska Commercial Development recently completed an $85 million "trophy" space at 10th and G Street.

The National Capital YWCA, which occupied the lower floors of the 9th Street building, moved to a new 15,000 square-foot location at 14th and Florida in December.
Washington D.C. real estate development news

American Institute of Architects Opens New DC Center Tomorrow

How stressful is it for the architect chosen to design a new center for architects? According to the winning team at Hickok Cole, not that stressful. Hundreds of architects will have their chance to judge the design tonight as the DC chapter of the American Institute of Architects unveils the District Architecture Center. The new Penn Quarter showroom, an 11,000 s.f. retail space for architects and public education of architecture, will offer free admission to the public beginning tomorrow to "learn more about the importance and impact of architecture design and the profession," and will kick off the week with a series of public lectures throughout the week.

Hickok Cole won the design competition from 16 submissions to design the architecture headquarters, beginning a full renovation this May that is still wrapping up in advance of tonight's private unveiling. The remake transforms the two-story retail space on 7th Street - once the Obama souvenir shop - into offices, classrooms, and instructional space that serves to educate AIA members while pulling in foot traffic to engage and instruct with videos and links to DC's better examples of architectural design. The AIA wants you to appreciate the sense of transparency:

[the space has] two distinct volumes: a wood room that signifies solidity, and a glass room that suggests openness. Together, the two rooms produce a sense of warmth and openness. The use of glass walls and a glass ‘bridge’ for the center classroom in the heart of the building extends the feeling of openness and makes the building appear more spacious, while connecting it to the lower level. Natural daylight flows through the street storefront into the glass volume, and down to the lower level.

With interior walls composed almost entirely of glass, most of ground floor is visible from the street, back to the rear board room, filled in between with polished concrete and walnut floors and a two-story glass box that serves as offices (below) and a meeting room above. A floating glass bridge serves to connect the two meeting spaces while illuminating the subterranean office space. Exposed I-beams lend a design motif to the center, with railing stanchions and desks imitating the shape and color of the original beams. "We tried to create as much transparency as possible," said Tom Corrado, an architect with Hickok Cole that was responsible for executing the design vision.

The $1.9m makeover (about $400,000 over budget, alas) was contrived to achieve a LEED Gold ranking within the 1917 Oddfellows Building, and precedes, just barely, the 125th anniversary of the AIA that will be celebrated in Washington D.C. next year, drawing architects from around the country for the convention.

While conspiracy minded architects might note that Hickok Cole was not only the winning bidder, but also on the AIA DC board and judged the competition (and a major donor to the center), Michael Hickok assures DCMud that the competition was blind and - really, truly - judged as anonymous bids.

Hickok shrugged off the pressure from being judged on his work by the many architects that will use the space, saying the design was routine. "You do what you do. We didn't give this more attention" than other projects. Hundreds of architects are likely to be on hand tonight to judge for themselves if the inspiration was worthy of DC's public face of architecture. For those that can't make it to the center, check out the DC architecture app for your phone.