Developer Edward J. Minskoff and Mike Kelly, head of Real Estate Americas at J.P. Morgan Global Alternatives, broke ground on 29 Jay Street, an office/retail project that will be the first new office space construction in DUMBO, Brooklyn in more than a century. Designed by the architecture firm Marvel, the development will contain approximately 240,000 square feet of Class-A office space and approximately 12,000 square feet of retail space. Construction will result in more than 200 jobs over the next two years.
“This development is the most exciting I have undertaken in my 40-plus years of office building development,” Minskoff said. “DUMBO is a cutting-edge confluence of culture, historic fabric, innovative technology and youth. The pandemic may have paused the New York market, but we now see people flowing back to our buildings in Manhattan and energizing the economy. For anyone that doubts our decision to build at this time, I will remind them that others doubted my building all 7.5 million square feet of World Financial Center in one phase and, more recently, 51 Astor Place in Greenwich Village with no pre-leasing and in advance of the area enjoying renown as a technology hub. Both of these projects are, of course, enduring success stories.”
The building site is at the northeast corner of Jay Street and Plymouth Street – one block from The East River and Brooklyn Bridge Park. The site was home to a portion of the Arbuckle Coffee and Tea conglomerate during the first half of the 20th century. Arbuckle was once the nation’s foremost purveyor of coffee for distribution. The hulking Arbuckle warehouse that was once on the site was eventually replaced by a simple low-rise building in the 1970’s. The City Planning Commission worked with the property owner and the community to rezone this corner of DUMBO in 2018 to allow higher density commercial office use.
“Designing a building in the historic DUMBO district, interpreting its scale, texture, color and proportions, is one of one of the great design challenges of all time—and one we hope will be a timeless contribution to the City of New York,” said Jonathan Marvel added.
