First DOB permits filed for Watchtower site overhaul

Aby Rosen and Michael Fuchs, whose RFR Realty is partnering with Kushner Companies and LIVWRK Holdings to turn the former Watchtower buildings into tech-friendly office space, have filed the first round of construction permits for the Dumbo site.

So far, permits for mechanical and plumbing work, as well as removing interior portions of the buildings at 55 Prospect Street, 81 Prospect Street, 117 Adams Street, 77 Sands StreetAnd 175 Pearl Street in Dumbo, have been approved by the Department of Buildings. The department is still sorting through additional plans for modifications to the building’s base structure and other construction, according to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

RFR and the Kushner Companies purchased the complex in October, part of a $375 million deal with the Jehovah’s Witnesses that included a 90 Sands Street hotel that the group is continually using through 2017. [Brooklyn Daily Eagle] and [Brownstoner] — Julie Strickland