Bowery: From Grit To Glamour?
The Bowery’s rise in value was inevitable, according to Besen & Associates director Ishan Chhabra, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to pack away the paint brushes and chisels just yet.
The $8.3M sale of 298 Elizabeth St and 306 Bowery in Manhattan’s NoHo neighborhood raised a few eyebrows earlier this year. The deal, which was brokered by Ishan and Besen executive director Amit Doshi, included two conjoined spaces that will cover about 8k SF combined.
Despite the sizable space, there was no room for a neighborhood institution.
Patricia Field, who earned her rep designing costumes on the HBO hit Sex and the City, has relocated her business and her famous client list instead of paying an expected $200/SF. If patronage by Lady Gaga and Miley Cyrus couldn’t keep this unique stylist put, is the Bowery’s gentrification costing the neighborhood its bohemian roots?
"I started my store when I was 24 years old, and it has led me onto all the wonderful professional roads I have taken," the Emmy-winning 74-year-old told the New York Daily News. (She won in 2002 for Sex and the City and in 2009 for Ugly Betty).
“First of all,” Ishan says, "the neighborhood’s increasing NYU presence and several major public transportation hubs—the J, Z and 6 trains—are bringing substantial foot traffic to the neighborhood’s diverse retail.
The Bowery’s retail continues to have such significant pull that the price of retail condominiums and other retail spaces have risen sharply. In 2014, for example, Thor Equities paid $4M for the 1,600 SF retail condo at 195 Bowery, double the price paid when it traded hands in 2006, according to the Commercial Observer.
“The Bowery is continuing its transformation into one of Manhattan’s most vibrant shopping corridors, fueled by the area’s new residential development, boutique hotels, museums, art galleries and nightlife,” Thor Equities CEO Joseph Sitt tells Bisnow.
Ishan says that young professionals with disposable income are flocking to the area to scope out the new bars and restaurants. He points to Avalon Bay’s Bowery Place, Vandal restaurant/lounge, Vella Equities’ 250 Bowery, and others as prime spots for this crowd to hang their hats (instead of their smocks).
Rents are rising and so is the general cost of living, Besen chief sales officer Ron Cohen says.
“The Bowery is one of those storied New York City streets with distinct character," he says. "While it has visibly evolved from the CBGB, punk rock, graffiti era, there is indelible grit that now translates to glamour, in true NYC fashion. People were actually upset about the prospect of removing the graffiti from 190 when RFR acquired it.”
But that’s not to say the neighborhood has completely abandoned its art and culture scene.
In addition to the International Center of Photography, which will be moving its new museum to the neighborhood, the Observer writes that RFR Realty leased the entirety of 190 Bowery to “a consortium of fashion-related artists,” who will be taking 30k SF in the building. The graffitied building’s 6k SF ground floor would also be marketed.
At the end of the day, Ishan says that while historic Bowery institutions like Fields and CBGB are making way for high-end, global retail tenants, it’s not losing the arts scene or unique retail that made it what it was.
“It’s simply bringing in a higher and wider class of tenant (in every sense of the word), which will only help the neighborhood grow,” he says.
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