The Lab in Denver Sold to JV

The Lab, a new 78,640-square-foot, four-story office building behind Denver Beer Co. in the Central Platte Valley, traded hands this month as Platte Land LLC sold the property to Lab Platte Properties LLC, a partnership between San Francisco-based Soma Capital Partners and Philadelphia-based CenterSquare Investment Management, a BNY Mellon company. Terms of the deal or a sale price were not disclosed; city property records show that the building is valued at $6,726,300, and previously sold in March 2014 for $270,000 when Bellio 17th Street Holdings transfered the building to Platte Land.

WeWork Cos., a New York City-based international co-working firm, also announced this week that it will lease the majority of the Lab, expected to cover about 65% of the building. The developers of the Triangle Building near Union Station confirmed that WeWork will also occupy 72,000 square feet in that soon-to-be-completed office building at nearby 1550 Wewatta St., according to a Denver Post article. The remaining office space at the Lab, about 25,000 square feet, is still available for lease through CBRE, and Urban Legend is handling the retail stalls.

"We began talking to WeWork about Denver in late 2014 because we saw this as a natural fit for their expansion from gateway markets like New York and San Francisco," said Jordan Caspari, partner at Soma Capital. "The average WeWork member is 32 years old with a focus on work-life balance."

The Lab was developed by Denver-based Confluent Development in partnership with Brue Capital. A slideshow of the property is featured on the Denver Business Journal website. For more news and information, visit Blumberg Partners.

JV Developing New Brooklyn Navy Yard Workspace

Boston Properties, Inc., Rudin Development and WeWork, in conjunction with the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation, announced this week that, under a joint initiative, the companies will be developing a new 675,000-square-foot building at the Brooklyn Navy Yard to cater to the rapidly emerging technology and creative industries in Brooklyn. The new building, dubbed Dock 72 at The Brooklyn Navy Yard, is a $380 million project scheduled to begin in late 2015 with an anticipated tenant delivery in late 2017. The building design created by S9 Architecture, an affiliate of Perkins Eastman, is designed to drive innovation and collaboration between tenants. According to the agreement between the development team and BNYDC, all tenants in the building will pay a living wage to their employees, making it the first new development in Brooklyn with such a commitment.

"From start-ups to expanding firms, this new workspace is going to put thousands of New Yorkers to work and help launch the next great wave of home-grown innovation. We are growing the Navy Yard's capacity for manufacturing, tech and the maker economy faster than any time in its modern history. We are thrilled to work with Boston Properties, Rudin Development and WeWork to bring this new space online and keep building on the Navy Yard's incredible success story," said NYC Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development Alicia Glen.

"The tenants that occupy this new building will contribute to the modern industrial ecosystem of the Yard—where technology, design and manufacturing converge. The shared work space will nurture hundreds of small businesses and spark the next generation of large-scale employers in the Yard," added BNYDC President and CEO David Ehrenberg. "Furthermore, this type of large, private-sector investment signals a watershed moment in the growth of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Thanks to this vote of confidence from respected investors and developers and this partnership with WeWork, BNYDC will be able to attract additional top creative and industrial firms that will create thousands of jobs for local residents."

For more news and information visit Blumberg Partners.