Rudin, Boston Properties' High-Profile Brooklyn Project Finally Lands First Non-WeWork Tenant

Online cooking and home brand Food52 is moving its office from Manhattan to a full floor at Dock 72 in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

The company has signed a 42K SF lease at the building, Rudin Development and Boston Properties announced, and it plans to move to the Brooklyn waterfront in the second half of next year.

"Through the pandemic, we redefined our vision for the future of the workplace and how we'll intertwine our worlds of content and commerce creation just as we do on our site," Food52 CEO Amanda Hesser said in a statement. "We're already beginning to build out studios, communal spaces and test kitchens in the light-filled space for our team and collaborators to help even more people enjoy life’s most important pleasures — food, home and connection to others."

WeWork, which served as a co-developer on the 670K SF Dock 72, has until now been the building's sole tenant occupying 220K SF. Reports emerged over the summer that Vice Media was looking at inking a big lease in the property, but no agreement has been formally announced. Rudin Executive Vice President Michael Rudin said the deal speaks to the tech community’s “continued faith” in the future of the borough and the city.

Dock 72 opened in 2019, right around the time WeWork’s first attempt at going public was going south. In January, Boston Properties said it had taken impairment charge in the quarter of 2020 because of the protracted lease-up and extra costs at the property. The fair value of the property, which at the time was only 33% leased, was lowered, resulting in a sizable balance sheet loss for the REIT.

The 16-story building was built on the site of a former shipbuilding facility as the first ground-up office development in Brooklyn in over a decade. Asking rents were not made public.