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Edward 
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NEW YORK POST
By LOIS WEISS
April 10, 2002 -- Retail developer Ken Himmel, whose Palladium group is partnering with Related Companies and Apollo to develop the AOL Time Warner Center, said they have signed yet another five-star chef for the project's fourth floor restaurants.
Chef Masa Takayam, whose $250 a meal Ginza Sushi-Ko in Beverly Hills is typically described as the most expensive and elegant dining experience in that ritzy town, has now signed for 5,000 square-feet at AOL TW.
He joins the previously revealed Jean-Georges Vongrichten steakhouse and the first city spot for Thomas Keller of The French Laundry in Napa Valley, around whose 13,000 square feet the developers designed the entire dining floor.
As part of a panel describing the AOL TW Center to the Association of Real Estate Women yesterday at the Harvard Club, Himmel said the restaurant experience will be similar to Bellagio's in Las Vegas.
"I wish we had a casino here but we don't," he said. "It would have been easier to make the numbers work." Expect to be paying mucho dineros to make them work when the project begins its phased opening in the fall of 2003.
P.S. He and Stephen Ross of Related shook hands yesterday morning with a 17,000 square-foot retailer for the western end of the upscale indoor mall.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 10:43 pm on Aug. 27, 2002 | IP
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Edward
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From the May issue of New York Magazine...
BY BETH LANDMAN KEIL
When the Palace Restaurant opened with a $50 prix fixe back in the seventies, people were shocked. Then came the eighties and the Quilted Giraffe, whose $75 menu inspired a Daily News critic to say "Barry Wine might as well hold a gun to your head and demand your wallet.'' In 2000, Alain Ducasse broke the $100 barrier with a $160 six-course meal, becoming the most extravagant in New York. But not for long . . .
Masa Takayama, chef and owner of the Beverly Hills restaurant Ginza Sushiko -- which has a $300 per person minimum -- has inked a deal for a New York outpost in the new AOL Time Warner Building, set to open in Columbus Circle by August 2003. (The fourth floor, a veritable foodie heaven, will include the East Coast branch of Tom Keller's French Laundry and Jean-Georges Vongerichten's steakhouse, Prime.)
Once here, Takayama will set his sights even higher: "I will charge more," he declares. "Maybe $400 or $500 per person at dinner -- without alcohol."
Takayama doesn't use menus, preferring to chat to diners about their preferences before whipping up a 25-course feast, featuring such delicacies as roasted sea urchin with snow crab, and poached foie gras with tosazu vinaigrette. Mmm, sounds delicious. Let's just hope that by the time Takayama has laid out his chopsticks, AOL Time Warner's stock will have bounced back enough for execs to actually dine there.
From the May 20, 2002 issue of New York Magazine.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 10:45 pm on Aug. 27, 2002 | IP
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Edward
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NEW YORK POST By STEVE CUOZZO
March 12, 2002
When The Post's Fashion Buzz column broke the news last week that cosmetics giant Estee Lauder, now in the GM Building, was thinking about a move into the AOL Time Warner Centre at Columbus Circle, it set off some head-scratching.
The twin-towered structure will house AOL Time Warner, a Mandarin Oriental hotel, luxury condos, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and restaurants and shops. But where is there office space available?
Related Cos. CEO Stephen Ross solved the little mystery. Related and its development partner, Apollo Realty, have about 300,000 square feet in the north tower, above the stores and below the hotel. Of that, Ross says, about 200,000 square feet could be leased to a tenant.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 10:51 pm on Aug. 27, 2002 | IP
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Edward
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GLOBEST.COM
http://www.globest.com/RMIU1O08K9D.html
AOL Time Warner Center Signs Three Retail Tenants
By Diana M. Rodriguez
Last updated: Dec 11, 2002 11:27AM
NEW YORK CITY-Columbus Circle's mega mixed-use development, soon to be the home of AOL Time Warner and a Mandarin Oriental hotel, has added three high-end retail outlets to its roster, totaling 8,500 sf. The recently inked leases include a Rande Gerber bar and lounge, a Stuart Weitzman fashion boutique and a Tourneau luxury watch shop. Terms of the leases are not being disclosed.
Gerber’s latest nightlife venue garnered the most square-footage out of the three new commitments at the AOL time Warner Center. This high-class lounge will command 5,500 sf within the new complex coined The Shops at Columbus Circle. “I’m taking a slightly different approach with this venture,” says Gerber, noting the design “will be bit more sophisticated and elegant, while still maintaining a chic and sexy lounge that our guests expect from us.”
Gerber’s Midnight Oil Company is known for its trendy bar scenes, several of which are located in Manhattan hotels. In all, the company has developed 20 properties throughout the US.
Also adding to center’s posh appeal will be the new Westside flagship for Tourneau. This pricey watch retailer inked a lease for 1,200 sf on the ground floor of the Columbus Circle shopping center.
Famed fashion designer Stuart Weitzman will also be adding his name to luxury retail center, inking a lease for a 1,800 sf ground floor location. The store will add to the designer’s other Manhattan locales and will open--along with the complex--in the fall of 2003.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 11:54 am on Dec. 14, 2002 | IP
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Edward
Junior Member
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NEW YORK POST
EQUINOX SHOWING MANHATTAN MUSCLE
By BRADEN KEIL
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December 17, 2002 -- Upscale muscle palace Equinox is pumping up its presence in Manhattan and beyond.
Due to open in Manhattan next year will be a 31,000-square-foot facility at the AOL Time Warner Center in Columbus Circle (opening in the late fall) and a 33,000-square-foot club in TriBeCa next March.
The local expansion will add to the brand's growth from 13 to 22 locations by the end of next year, with memberships approaching nearly 60,000.
"We will be truly a national brand by the beginning of '03, with locations in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles," says Equinox CEO Harvey Spevak. "And we believe we're not only building a national lifestyle brand, but a global brand as well."
He says Western Europe will be the focus of the company's attention, but would not specify where in particular.
The clubs feature the latest equipment, high-end spa facilities and a high-profile membership roster that includes Gwyneth Paltrow, Rupert Everett, Spike Lee, Benjamin Bratt, Iman, Julianne Moore and several socialites.
An all-access membership to all Equinox locations is $135 per month, with a $495 initiation fee.
At AOL Time Warner, one might find new New York resident Ricky Martin working out his famed glutes.
"We're making the largest post-9/11 retail commitment to downtown for a Manhattan-based business," Spevak says of the TriBeCa location, which will include a day-care facility.
As for further local expansion: "We've just opened our first location in Connecticut last Friday [in Darien]," says Spevak. "We'll be opening in Woodbury, L.I., by next March."
The first Equinox was opened 11 years ago at 76th and Amsterdam by Danny Errico and his family.
Spevak was brought in by the Errico family in January 1999 - when there were only five clubs - to create a professional management team to build the company into a national brand. A year later, Spevak and the management team, along with two equity partners, bought out the family's interest for an undisclosed sum, reported to be close to $200 million.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 11:15 pm on Dec. 22, 2002 | IP
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Edward
Junior Member
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NEW YORK POST
http://www.nypost.com/realestate/66511.htm
AOL TW CENTER FILLING UP
By STEVE CUOZZO
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January 14, 2003 --
A lot of retail brokers laughed when Related Cos. CEO Stephen Ross said a few years ago that the shopping atrium in the new AOL Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle would make Trump Tower look like "a postage stamp."
A lot has changed since 1999, when the Coliseum still stood on the site and the project was known as "Time Warner Center."
But with the $1.8 billion, twin-towered edifice - offices, studios, the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, Lincoln Center Jazz and condos - scheduled to begin opening in stages by September, Ross said yesterday that 75 percent of the 360,000-square-foot atrium is already leased.
An ebullient Ross said the latest signings were LVMH's Sephora (5,500 square feet) and menswear shop Thomas Pink for 1,800. They come on the heels of jumbos like a 31,000-square-foot Equinox fitness center.
If Related and its retail-mall division Palladium have done their jobs right, the curving glass atrium that hugs the traffic circle's West circumference will provide a welcome shopping-and-strolling link between Midtown and the Upper West Side.
The Whole Foods upscale supermarket chain will have a 60,000-square-foot combination restaurant-market. Other tenants include restaurants from Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Thomas Keller and Gray Kunz, and retailers Williams-Sonoma, J. Crew, Armani A/X, Tourneau, Crabtree & Evelyn, Hugo Boss, Eileen Fisher and Stuart Weitzman.
Tenant brokers who wished not to be named credited Palladium with a flexible approach to pricing, with rents ranging from the $300s for ground-floor positions facing Columbus Circle to the high $100s for spaces on the sides or on higher floors.
"The numbers are all over the place," one said. "They're being very accommodating in order to achieve the tenant mix they want."
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 11:09 pm on Jan. 27, 2003 | IP
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Edward
Junior Member
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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/04/nyregion/04COLU.html
February 4, 2003
Developers Sell Half Interest in Mall at Columbus Circle
By DAVID W. DUNLAP
The developers of the AOL Time Warner Center, which is to begin opening in September, said yesterday they would sell almost half their interest in the center's enormous shopping mall to the California Public Employees' Retirement System and MacFarlane Partners, a real estate investment concern.
Though sheathed in a single skin of granite and glass, the $1.7 billion two-tower center on Columbus Circle is actually made up of seven condominiums: AOL Time Warner headquarters, a smaller block of speculative office space, performance halls for Jazz at Lincoln Center, a Mandarin Oriental Hotel, a 191-unit residential development, a 504-space parking garage and the seven-level mall.
MacFarlane and the pension system, known as Calpers, are expected to pay from $425 million to $500 million for a 49.5 interest in the mall, garage and speculative office space. The transaction is to occur in January 2005.
The final price will be based on a formula that takes into account a year's worth of operating income from the three commercial units, said Marty Burger, executive vice president of The Related Companies, which is developing AOL Time Warner Center with Apollo Real Estate Advisors.
As part of the deal, MacFarlane and Calpers, acting as a joint venture, are immediately to pay down $359 million of the projects' $1.42 billion construction loan from the GMAC Commercial Mortgage Corporation.
Related and Apollo will still own a 50.5 percent share of the mall, garage and office space. The developers and Mandarin Oriental jointly own the 251-room hotel. AOL Time Warner and Jazz at Lincoln Center will own their spaces. The apartments are being sold individually.
Victor B. MacFarlane, managing principal and chief executive of MacFarlane Partners, based in San Francisco, said the investment fit into his firm's involvement with urban areas in transition; this project, he said, would create a stronger link between Times Square and the Upper West Side.
Despite the problems facing AOL Time Warner, Mr. MacFarlane said yesterday: "All the indications are that they are going to move in. The divisions that are most talked about as being spun off aren't really here."
Stephen M. Ross, chairman and chief executive of Related, said last fall that AOL Time Warner had already put up its money and that the development therefore had "no exposure" to AOL Time Warner's difficulties.
Leases have been signed or are pending for 87 percent of the 330,000 square feet of rentable space in the retail area. There is a 30,000-square-foot store on the second floor that the developers will not discuss but is understood to be committed to Borders Books and Music. Borders was listed on a retail roster prepared by the developers for a Jan. 21 advertising supplement, "At the Center," inserted in copies of The New York Times.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 10:21 pm on Feb. 4, 2003 | IP
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Edward
Junior Member
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NEW YORK POST
By LOIS WEISS
March 19, 2003 --
The Shops at Columbus Circle in the spectacular atrium of the AOL Time Warner Center have added yet another European-based retailer.
4You will move into 9,581 square feet next to J. Crew on the second level where asking rents are $100 a foot.
Alan Napack of Cushman & Wakefield represented 4You while the project was repped in-house by developer The Related Companies.
The fashion forward Danish-based retailer has shops all over the European continent and is licensed in the U.S. to Elizabeth Hazen, who has already opened 4You's first U.S. store in Hollywood.
The company also sells here through Bloomingdale's and Macy's and intends to come out with a women's line later this year.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 1:16 am on Mar. 29, 2003 | IP
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Edward
Junior Member
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http://www.globest.com/RMITXXP6NED.html
Two Retailers Take 14,400 SF in Manhattan
By Diana M. Rodriguez
Last updated: Apr 18, 2003 10:57AM
... Separately, high-end eyewear retailer Morgenthal Frederics has grabbed 400 sf on the ground floor of the AOL Time Warner Center in the Shops at Columbus Circle. The new location will be the company's flagship and is slated to open in the fall of 2003.
Mitchell Friedel, senior VP and director of leasing for Related Urban Development, acted on behalf of the developer the Related Companies. Morgenthal was represented by Darryl Kaplan of Blatteis Schur. Terms of the deal were undisclosed.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 9:12 pm on April 23, 2003 | IP
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Edward
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AOL Time Warner Center Proves Popular
By Barbara Jarvie
Last updated: Jun 30, 2003 11:19AM
NEW YORK CITY–AOL Time Warner Center is proving to be a sought after location, with retail leasing proceeding ahead of schedule. Opening in October 2003, 95% of the space is leased. And, according to published reports, AOL Time Warner has agreed to buy at cost another 100,000 sf of office space from the developers. A spokesperson for developer the Related Cos. could not confirm the report.
The seven-level retail component of the 2.8 million sf AOL Time Warner Center, collectively known as The Shops at Columbus Circle, will consist of a retail, restaurant, and entertainment complex totaling 350,000 sf of leasable space.
Once completed, the center will feature a mix of over 40 luxury and specialty retailers along with five world-class restaurants and a park view “one-of-a-kind” luxury bar. Major retailers will include Hugo Boss, Joseph Abboud, A/X Armani Exchange, Sephora, Cole Haan, J. Crew, Eileen Fisher, Thomas Pink, Coach, Stuart Weitzman, Tourneau, Whole Foods, Equinox, Borders and Williams-Sonoma. On the second concourse level, The Equinox Health Club and Spa will create a 40,000 sf “club within a club," while Whole Foods will occupy 60,000 sf on concourse level one.
The complex, master designed by David M. Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, and retail designed by Howard Elkus of Elkus/Manfredi in Boston, is being developed by the Related Companies LP and Apollo Real Estate Advisors LP. The project will feature the new 879,000 sf world headquarters of AOL Time Warner, a Jazz at Lincoln Center performing arts facility with three main performance venues amd rehearsal and recording studios and classrooms. There will also be the Shops at Columbus Circle featuring luxury and specialty retail shops and Restaurant Collection, the One Central Park residential condominiums containing 191 luxury apartments, a 251-room five-star Mandarin Oriental, New York, 200,000 sf of state-of-the-art Class A office space, and a 504 stall valet parking garage.
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Total Posts: 51 | Joined May 2002 | Posted on: 12:10 pm on July 6, 2003 | IP
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1 Central Park Forum
Retail leasing at AOL Time Warner Center
