Intercontinental, Najem notch law firm’s Fulton Market expansion

The first law firm to hang its shingle in Fulton Market is nearly doubling its footprint less than a year after opening its new digs in Chicago’s hottest submarket, demonstrating the area’s enticement even as the city’s legal sector cuts down overall on office space.

Norton Rose Fulbright is adding 15,000 square feet at developer Fulton Street Co’s. 1045 West Fulton Street, bringing its lease in the 12-story building to 32,000 square feet total, or a little more than 20 percent of the whole building, according to a person familiar with the deal.

The expansion follows Norton in 2022 signing a lease to become the first major law firm to make Fulton Market its Chicago office base. The office opened in August as the global company’s 12th U.S. location and 52nd worldwide.

That deal was considered emblematic of Fulton Market’s ongoing evolution from a burgeoning office hub for tech firms into an attractive spot for white-shoe professional service companies.

Norton’s initial lease was followed by an even bigger one struck by law firm Greenberg Traurig for 90,000 square feet in developer Sterling Bay’s 360 North Green Street, which is nearly complete. Greenberg decided to move to that tower after corporate advisory firm Boston Consulting Group agreed to lease 200,000 square feet of the property starting in 2025.

Unlike traditional law firm office layouts that emphasize private individual spaces, Norton’s design for its Fulton Market office is an open floor plan; the firm relies on technology including a mobile and web-based booking system that lets its Chicago personnel reserve various types of spaces within the building to work in on any given day.

“Our new home in Fulton Market reimagines the law firm office experience to focus on technology, flexibility and collaboration,” Daniel Farris, Norton’s Chicago partner-in-charge, said when the space was unveiled.

The firm now occupies the building’s 10th through 12th floors as well as half of the ninth.

The quick expansion of Norton’s lease represents a major win for the landlords, Boston-based Intercontinental Real Estate Corp. and developer Alex Najem’s Fulton Street Cos.. And it’s a boon more broadly for Chicago’s struggling office market, which topped 25 percent vacancy for the first time in the first quarter this year — a grim new record for landlords driven in large part by other law firms cutting the size of their office space.

Brokerage Madison Rose represents the landlords in leasing the building.

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