A New American Idol in Times Square
Published: May 19, 2010
The Proskauer associate comments on the subject of “Office Space” in the 2010 Vault Associate Survey share some basic themes: “Office space is outdated … Building is inefficient … Hope we move soon … We are looking to move ….” Well, sometimes associates’ daydreams do come true: Proskauer Rose has signed a deal to become the anchor tenant at 11 Times Square under “extremely favorable” terms, according to the New York Law Journal.
According to the Journal, the lease can be taken as “an encouraging sign of recovery in the commercial real estate market.” The building’s developers and owners, SJP Properties, broke ground for the project in May 2007, which probably seemed like a really good idea at the time. (Proskauer is the first-and-only tenant so far.) “We're taking advantage of what I think is really the opportune time in terms of the New York real estate market,” said Proskauer’s chairman Allen Fagin. (In other words, Fagin’s firm did to SJP what his Dickensian namesake did to Victorian Londoners.)
On the subject of Green/Sustainability, Proskauer survey respondents told Vault, “The firm is constantly looking for ways to be greener.” Yet, until now, this impulse hasn’t amounted to much: “The firm has a ‘GreenSpaces’ initiative, but it's toothless. Setting all copies to double-sided as a default was a nice touch. But the ‘recycle bins’ in most attorney's offices just get dumped into the trash by the night cleaning crews.” With the move to 11 Times Square, however, the firm takes its sustainability measures to higher level: “the space features a glass-curtain exterior that the developer said will benefit environmentally conscious tenants in terms of reducing heat gain, thermal loss and utility costs.” So put that in your pipe and smoke it, hippies.
The most intriguing aspect of the deal has to be that Proskauer “landed exclusive signage rights for a 50-foot-long, 20-foot-high backlit sign near the top of the 40-story building.” That is one whopping big neon sign for a law firm, putting Paul Hastings to shame. With that sign, expect Proskauer to achieve one of BigLaw’s highest recognizability quotients within a couple of years.
-posted by brian