A rendering of the Howard Hughes Center, set to re-open in early 2019
Blackstone’s Equity Office is hopping on the co-working bandwagon.
The firm signed a licensing agreement with New York-based Industrious to run co-working spaces at a handful of properties in Los Angeles, starting with between 100,000 and 140,000 square feet at the six-building Howard Hughes Center campus near Playa Vista, according to a press release.
Industrious will also manage ground-floor spaces across the campus, manage some conference duties, and provide amenities available to tenants working outside of its co-working offices.
The firm closed an $80 million round of funding in February and a month later inked leases for two new spaces in L.A. — one in Century City and another in Irvine — totaling 26,000 square feet. Industrious also operates spaces in West Hollywood and Downtown.
Equity Office separately announced Wednesday that it will rebrand itself as EQ Office. It will reposition some properties as “more flexible, dynamic environments,” with amenities that appeal to the sensibilities of tech and creative firms.
The Howard Hughes Center will be one of the first properties to get the treatment, which isn’t a surprise given its location near Playa Vista, where YouTube, Yahoo!, Google, and a number of other tech companies have planted flags.
EQ Office is adding “health-centric initiatives” and fitness facilities, a farmer’s market, a conference center and outdoor work spaces. It will also make the campus dog-friendly, the firm said. It hopes to reopen next January.
It’s not the only firm investing in the new office model in the area. Rockwood Capital is moving quickly to break ground on a 190,000-square-foot creative office building at the Water’s Edge campus, in the northwest section of Playa Vista.
The deal with Industrious isn’t exclusive. EQ Office said it was “eager to continue working with all the best in class providers,” and mentioned other co-working firms that currently lease space at its properties, including Regus, WeWork, and Convene.
EQ Office picked up the Howard Hughes Center in June 2016 as part of a larger seven-property, $1.6 billion buy from Hines Real Estate Investment Trust. JLL, which was handling leasing there as of October 2016, could not be reached for comment regarding the Industrious partnership.
The Blackstone-owned company has otherwise been trying to sell off properties in L.A., listing assets from Santa Monica to Glendale.
Powered by WPeMatico