225 Varick Street Honored - Named 2019 Urban Land Institute Awards for Excellence New York Finalist

The Hudson Square Properties portfolio, 12 buildings in the West Village, Hudson Square, Tribeca and Soho neighborhoods, has been at the heart of a concerted redevelopment and repositioning effort over the last two years. 225 Varick Street in particular has seen a significant transformation.

In recognition of this achievement, 225 Varick has been honored as a finalist in the 2019 ULI Awards for Excellence in the Repositioning or Redevelopment category.

The Urban Land Institute (ULI) Awards for Excellence were established to recognize best-in-class development projects in the private, public, and nonprofit sectors across New York State, that best exemplify ULI’s commitment to responsible land use and creation of sustainable, thriving communities.

The repositioning of 225 Varick Street has brought new life to a multi-tenant office building originally constructed in 1929 to house printing presses. The renovation transformed the building’s at-grade condition with a completely new lobby and storefront for the north half of the building. The renovated lobby includes an expansion that combined the existing lobby with an adjacent vacant retail space –providing more natural light and affording the office tenants with a more gracious and hospitable entry experience. The renovation of the retail space focused on enlarging storefront windows and providing access to a large unused basement. The building upgrades convinced Shake Shack to relocate their office headquarters to the building and to create their “Innovation Kitchen” in the newly created retail space – a Shake Shack restaurant with a test kitchen in the below-grade space that will experiment with new menu items. The building achieved an Energy Star designation in 2018 and is currently engaged in a 5-year LEED performance scoring program, targeting LEED Gold by April 2019. After completion in 2018, 225 Varick has achieved 100% occupancy for the first time in decades, becoming a vibrant gateway to the Hudson Square neighborhood.